Marvel: New World Order
by Parker Valentine
Summary: ***On HIATUS***A world in the hands of it s most powerful villains. And only a small fraction of heroes is still alive, fighting against the regime of evil.
1. Chapter 1

Welcome to my next story based on characters created by Marvel Comics.

So I don´t own them.

This will be a more dark story with some mature content.

WARNING: There will be many – and I mean _many_ – deaths coming in this chapter!

Hope you will still like it.

 **Chapter 1: The last day of heroism**

It was deep dark night in New York City. Hell´s Kitchen was probably the last place in the city anyone should visit at this time. Other parts of the Big Apple were not that much safer after sunset, but Hell´s Kitchen deserved it´s name especially around midnight.

But there was one man guarding the people living here. He was their guardian devil. The man without fear. Daredevil. He was as always seen in his complete crimson costume, which only revealed his lower half of the face. On his forehead were two small horns and on his chest were two prints of the fourth letter of the alphabet flowing into each other.

This night the vigilante, whose real name was Matt Murdock, headed to a specific warehouse, where a deal was supposed to happen tonight. Something about a new weapon type that could change the already hard war on the streets to the worse. He checked with his sonar-like hearing if anyone was already in the warehouse. To his surprise he could only locate one heartbeat inside the wooden building. One heartbeat he knew too well. Without any hesitation he leaped forward and used his slingshot to swing his way to a open window. He took out the momentum by rolling when he landed, to avoid any damage.

When he was back on his feet he called for someone: "Frank? I know you´re here!"

"Come down, red.", a stern voice answered and Daredevil did as he was told.

He couldn´t see the man in front of him, but he knew that he was probably completely dressed in black Kevlar-clothes with a white skull-painting on his chest. Frank Castle alias The Punisher was a man he faced many times. A former soldier with his own, twisted version of justice who would not back down to kill criminals. But he knew which evenly twisted fate led to this man´s decision to murder the bad guys. And to some extend, both men even respected each other, considering how many times they worked together.

"What are you doing here, Frank?", DD wondered harshly.

"I could ask you the same. Guess we´re after the same guy, huh?", Punisher answered in his typical stoical manner.

"Guess so...", was the man in red saying. "I followed a trace by Turk Barrett. He told me that one of his rivals was having a bigger deal than he ever had. Whoever the supplier was, he has to be one of the big guns."

"One member of the Maggia told me the same, before I introduced him to the elevator shaft.", the black-dressed man grunted as he checked the surrounding by walking around.

Daredevil shook his head and sighed: "You´ll never stop, right?" He didn´t expected an answer, which was unimportant because he already knew it.

"It doesn´t seem that anyone will come.", Punisher remarked. "Not even the tiniest traces that somebody has been here for a very long time."

"You believe it´s a trap?", the devil said in a matter-of-fact tone and also already knew the coming answer, simply because in cases like this, both men had the same way of thinking.

"Not believe, I _know_ it, red." The former marine pulled out a huge machine gun. "Do you sense anything?"

The masked one of both individuals focused until he commented: "No, it´s like my senses have been numbed. There is no smell, no sound, nothi- wait, I hear something!" His expression became more focused as he heard: "...some kind of crackling!"

He finished his statement as a bolt of electricity shattered a part of the roof and hit the floor in front of both vigilantes. Both stepped back and braced themselves, Daredevil holding his stick in his right hand and Punisher lifting his gun. At the point that was hit by the lightning was now standing a bald headed man. His face was covered in scars formed like bolts. His upper clothing was dark green with yellow lightnings on it and even darker green, close to black gloves. His complete lower body was covered in the same blackish-dark green except his yellow boots.

"Well, well. Look who we got here! The hornhead and the skullface. I wish it was the spider...:", Electro´s voice crackled.

"We all wish it would have been the spider. But it doesn´t matter who we get. They followed the traces, so they have to deliver our message!", a nearly noble sounding, deep male voice answered in a thick Russian accent. The man had black hair going down to his shoulders and a evenly black beard covering the face around his mouth. He wore a vest that looked like the mane of a lion and dark brown trousers, equipped with holsters that were filled with different kinds of knives. In his right hand he held a spear. "Seems your tricks really worked. The devil couldn´t sense any of us until we wanted to, Mysterio. Good work."

"I love it when someone appreciates the work of an artists. But it hadn´t been possible without your jungle potions. Mysterio speaks out his thanks, Kraven!", a man wearing a green-yellow armored suit and purple cape answered and bowed down like an actor after a drama. On his head was something that resembled some kind of fish-bowl.

Punisher and Daredevil were standing back to back in the middle of the warehouse.

"Any ideas, Frank?"

"How about shooting our way out?"

"It won´t work. Your bullets would never hit Electro. The last time I faced him I was lucky to survive and he was not even close to his current power level.", DD explained.

"So, what do we now?", Frank grunted.

"How about the simplest thing for you to do now: Dying!", another voice suggested, this time female and cunning. A woman with long blonde hair, covered in a white spandex suit with a golden diamond on her chest and a partly covered half of the face stood above them, her hands were glowing in some yellowish energy. "You two wont stand a chance against all twelve of us!"

"Did she just said 'twelve'?", Daredevil asked Punisher.

"I thought _you_ were the one with the super-hearing out of the two of us.", was the answer.

"Oh shit!"

Punisher and Daredevil were surrounded from all sides. Twelve costumed super-villains were now standing around them, lead by the blonde villainess called Moonstone. Both men could recognize their enemies as the already introduced Moonstone, Electro, Mysterio and Kraven. But they were accompanied by Klaw, the Grim Reaper, Scorpion, Abomination and all four members of the Wrecking Crew.

"This will be a long night.", Punisher sighed.

###

The sun was rising and it´s first rays were illuminating his room. Clint Barton alias Hawkeye woke up as the light touched his face. He turned his head away from the sun and wanted to wrap his arm around his beloved wife. But instead laying besides him she was already awake and dressing up in her gear.

"Morning, babe.", he murmured in a joyful but still tired tone. The blonde woman wearing a gray body-suit with navy blue stripes on her side and yellow goggles covering her blue eyes turned around and slowly moved towards him with a bright smile: "Good morning, dork. Sorry I woke you up."

"Why are you already geared up, Bobbi?"

"Fury called me.", Bobbi Morse alias Mockingbird answered. "He said it was urgent, so I have to go."

"What´s the matter?"

"Sorry, I´m not allowed to talk to you about any information!", she smiled at him and kissed his lips.

"Hey, not long ago I was also part of SHIELD!", he playfully accused.

"That´s the thing: You _were_ a SHIELD-Agent until you said you have enough of all this secrets and that Fury is just grumpy for not being able to watch 3D movies."

"Well, technically he really isn´t able to watch 3D movies with just one eye." Bobbi walked to the door and said, facing him: "Yeah, but you shouldn´t have told him that face-to-face. Sorry, have to go now."

"We see each other later?", Hawkeye asked still laying under his sheet.

"Of course. It will be just like any other mission. Go in, kick some bad guys, extraction. Love you, babe." She left her husband alone in his bed, where he could hear that she greeted in her hurry someone else who was already awake. His palms were now on his face as he thought about leaving the bed now and talked to himself:

"Two more minutes?" He heard two other voices also chatting in the corridor. "Well, not this time..."

A few minutes later Clint entered the kitchen of the Avengers Tower, wearing only his light blue shorts and a gray, washed out 'Johnny Cash'-shirt. When he made his way to the coffee machine he was greeted by his fellow teammates Steve Rogers alias Captain America and Carol Danvers alias Ms Marvel. Or Captain Marvel how she started to call herself recently.

"Good Morning, soldier.", the blonde man with a short military cut greeted friendly. He sat there with his white t-shirt, dark green jeans and two dog tags around his neck, holding a cup of coffee in his left hand.

"Morning, Steve. Morning, Carol.", Clint yawned.

"Not enough sleep, eh?", the blonde female, ponytail-wearing Captain of the team asked. She wore a dark blue shirt and a black sweatpants. She also held a cup of coffee in her hands.

"Well, when Bobbi and I are together for a night, sleep is not our main activity.", he impishly grinned at them. "Ugh, okay I´m outta here." Carol raised her hands and left the room. Steve had to laugh at this as he took another sip out of his cup.

"I met her when she left. Another mission?"

"Yup.", Clint answered as he searched for some pads for their coffee machine. "It´s a strange feeling not knowing _anything_ about her missions, now that I´m officially out of SHIELD.

Tell me, Steve...", his head went back and forth as he searched pads. He held one he found in his hand and showed it the World War II veteran. "Is this one the only pad left?"

"It seems so. Where´s the problem, Clint?" Steve finished his cup.

"The problem is this one is without caffeine! Who the hell has brought coffee without caffeine into this house! What´s the sense behind that!"

Steve looked the table and shook his head smiling. Luke Cage entered the kitchen, wearing a black t-shirt and blue jeans. His hand slid over his freshly shaved bald head as he greeted his teammates. When Clint finally finished his rant the Afro-American man said dryly: "I don´t see your problem, Clint..."

Clint raised his hands as he left the kitchen and cursed: "Nobody understands me! Thanks for nothing, Luke!"

"Don´t worry, Luke. Nobody understands his problem..."

"Should we tell him that Pietro used nearly all coffee-pads today?"

Both watched a still ranting Hawkeye making his way to the toilet, which was occupied.

"Better not..", Cap chuckled.

Suddenly a woman with long, raven-black hair, wearing a dark red pullover and blue jeans rushed into the kitchen. It was Jessica Drew, also known as Spider-Woman.

She had a worried and sad expression on her face, saying in a British accent:

"Cap, you have to watch this..."

###

"- _witnessing a hateful act of sadism and cruelty. The two individuals known as the costumed vigilantes Daredevil and Punisher have been found slaughtered in the most gruesome thinkable way. Both men were tied around flag poles, her chests cut open and leaving their interior hanging out and partly dropping on the streets. On the wall, written in their blood were the words 'No more heroes, New World Order'._

 _What does this mean for the other costumed heroes? Are the people still save? Can the Avengers or X-Men still protect us-_ "

Cap shut down the TV. The members of his team that were sitting in the living room were emotionally shattered. The green-yellow and red-faced android Vision had to calm down the completely in red dressed Wanda Maximoff, who started to tear up and cry after seeing the report.

Luke stood in the door and lowered his head. He considered Daredevil a really good friend and companion, so this was especially hard for him. Carol and Jessica were sitting speechless on the sofa. Carol leaned her body forward and stared at the floor, while Jessica had her right hand covering her mouth and fought her own tears. Hawkeye just stood behind both of them and bit his lips, forcing himself to calm down before he would snap.

"Okay, soldiers.", Steve finally spoke up. "We lost two brave men who were fighting for the good cause. Both had their own methods...partly some I would never approve of, but they did it for the same we do it: to protect the innocent. Matt and Frank were great heroes and friends in their own ways. They were not exactly what you would call 'easy-going', but they were always by our side when they were needed. And now they´re dead and the people are afraid to leave their houses. We can´t let that happen. If nobody feels save anymore or heroes are getting killed, the evil men and women we fight against win. And I personally don´t want this 'New World Order'. So let´s give both their heroes funeral and do what we´re named for: _Avenge them!_ "

"You heard the man. Gear up!", Carol said as she stood up and left the room. Steve walked towards Luke and rested his left hand on his shoulder: "I know you and Matt have been friends-"

"Don´t worry about me, Rogers. He knew his time would come sooner or later. He wouldn´t like it if we would give up just because some maniacs tore him apart. But he did not deserve that...nobody does..."

Tony Stark entered the room and looked worried at Wanda, Vision and Jessica who passed him.

"I saw the news. Terrible! We have to find out who killed them. This is the only thing we can do for both now."

Steve nodded and wanted to say something, but suddenly his communicator interrupted him.

"Yes?", he answered it.

"Cap! You guys have to get to the Times Square. Immediately!", the male voice on the other end yelled.

"Peter! What´s going on?"

"Well, it seems that we kinda have a super-villain tea party. And all inhabitants of the Raft have been welcomed here. Iron Fist, Quicksilver, Firestar, me and some others are getting our asses kicked. Even some SHIELD-Agents came to help. Black Widow, Coulson, Quake and Mockingbird are still fighting, but we already lost May and Dugan.", the voice said saddened, with some fighting noises in the background.

"We´re on our way, Peter. Stand your ground, son." He ended the talk on the communicator and looked at the goatee wearing in his expensive suit Tony: "Spider-Man and many others are under attack at the Times Square. Avengers Assemble!"

###

"Oh, man. That was not part of the contract!", Spider-Man quipped, wearing his typical red-blue spandex suit with white eye lenses, webbing pattern in the red parts of his costume and a small black spider on his chest and a big red one on his back.

"What contract?", the red-haired Black Widow, wearing her trademark skintight black suit and her golden arm gauntlets equipped with bullets and other types of ammunition. Her golden belt had a red hourglass-logo on it.

"The contract you sign when you become a costumed super-hero! There was not mentioned that _this_ mess is happening!", Spidey answered.

Both spider-themed heroes were taking cover behind a crashed bus and leading civilians into safety. As far as there was still anything like safety.

Widow somewhat grunted: "You´re making jokes? Right now?"

"That´s how I deal with it. It´s not like I think anything about this is funny, it´s definitely _not_ , but this how I deal with it if I don´t want to lose my sanity." He shoot a web-line into the face of one villain wearing a dark blue-silver armor and holding boomerangs in his hands, while kicking another villainess wearing a dark gray-metallic orange armor still revealing her face and brown hair and using some kind of blue glowing stick as a weapon, into the next car.

"As long as you are still helpful, I´m fine with it. Who were those?"

"Boomerang and Joystick. No heavy-hitters, but the less bad guys, the better will be our situation."

Widow looked out of her cover and shot two times. A groan was heard as she came back and said:

"I think I got Blizzard and Trapster. Don´t think they´ll make any trouble so soon."

Suddenly a blur whizzed it´s way to their side. It was their teammate Quicksilver holding a little girl in his arms. He put her on the floor and pointed towards a restaurant where some people hid themselves. "Go there, it´s safe!" She ran and he talked to his fellow heroes: "We can´t do it any longer. SHIELD´s making more losses than our enemies. We lost another agent..."

"Who?", Widow asked worried.

"Quartermain..."

"Damn!", she exclaimed furious.

"But that´s not all! Morse is hurt and Coulson is bringing her into safety. But we lost all contact, so they have to walk through the buildings, to stay unnoticed. They told me to inform you about it."

Widow was shaking in anger. She hated it when something bad happened to any other agent. Her thought was to run to them and get Bobbi, the wife of her closest friend into safety. But she couldn´t leave her fellow heroes alone against these villains. Spidey somehow could see her struggle and said: "Pietro! You get her to Bobbi and Phil. Then you´ll return here. Don´t worry, Natasha, we will make it."

"Thank you, Spider-Man.", she answered grateful and Pietro did as commanded.

The speedster left not a second ago as the bus they were hiding behind for their team-talk was lifted into the air.

The reason was a colossal behemoth, wearing a dark red and brownish armor with a bowl-shaped helmet that still showed his eyes and mouth.

"Long time, no see, web-head!", the man shouted as he held the vehicle over his head.

"It would have been better if it had stayed that way, Juggernaut!", the hero quipped and took the villains vision by webbing his eyes. This didn´t bother the monolith of a man that much as he leashed out, ready to hammer the vehicle on the spider´s head.

"I gonna squash you-"

"Please, don´t say it..."

"LIKE A BUG!", Juggernaut shouted as he slammed the bus on the floor. Spider-Man somersaulted himself away and remarked: "Ech...he said it..." He placed himself on a lamppost, but he had no time to breath as his spider-sense warned him from incoming missiles. He escaped them and saw that his new attacker was wearing a much bulkier version of Tony Stark´s armor. But his red color was much darker and instead of gold it was more a gray tone. The visor was also different shaped and black. On his chest was a yellow-glowing star. "Stand still, Spider-Man, so that I can easily crush you!"

" _'Easily crush you!'_ ", the web-slinger mocked his thick Russian accent. "You guys are soooo poetic, I love it." Now Juggernaut freed himself from the web and walked towards the hero. But before anything could have done by him, he was smashed into the ground by a huge green blur, hitting him like a meteor.

"Bug-Man is friend of Hulk! Hulk smash stupid Juggernaut!", the jade giant, only wearing dark blue shorts yelled.

The armored Russian, called Crimson Dynamo was also put to the ground by heavy blasts.

When Spidey looked up he could eye Captain Marvel hovering above him. She snarled towards the Dynamo: "I agree with our green friend. But I won´t be that polite." Her eyes started to glow in the same yellow light as her fists as she rushed towards the tin man and hammered him into the next wall, scattering parts of his armor and knocking him out.

On the other side of the Times Square were a few more heroes and villains fighting. A young man wearing a dark blue and white suit with a dark headpiece revealing his face and brown hair, having a yellow star on his chest and a dark blue cape, was fighting together with a young woman in the same age, wearing yellow-orange spandex with red gloves and boots. Her upper half of the face was covered by a red domino-mask and her bright red hair was also visible. Her body was surrounded by an flaming aura.

"Seems like the Avengers finally arrived, Angelica!", the man said.

"I see it, Vance...", she answered as she shot a flaming blast at a man dressed in a red and white armor of a knight during the crusade of the middle age. "Let´s hope our chances will get better now." Vance Astrovik alias Justice and Angelica Jones alias Firestar were assaulted from all sides. Both remembered some of their opponents from the files they saw, back in their days as members of the Avengers. Villains like Blackout, who could control dark force or the monkey-looking Mandrill were just two of the individuals. Another man Angelica identified as the literally man-eating, rat-like Vermin tried to jump at her, but he was suddenly hit midair by Captain America´s shield.

"Cap! Good to see you!", Justice exclaimed, throwing Mandrill with his telekinesis into a window.

"Listen, soldiers! This is not a sole incident! Wolverine called me on our way to you and said that Utopia is also under attack. And SHIELD had to report the loss of three helicarriers by different HYDRA groups. Even the contact to SWORD and Alpha Flight was lost, which could only mean that they also have been assaulted!"

Spider-Man, who joined them asked: "Are you saying this all is an coordinated attack?"

"Yes, Spider-Man. The deaths of Daredevil and Punisher were probably some kind of sick and twisted mind games to mentally weak us. And now they start a world-wide attack.", Iron Man, who was flying over them said.

Luke Cage and Spider-Woman were now in the middle of the battle, too. The latter one asked: "How is this even possible? Who could coordinate such masses of men and women, all with their own ego? And do even so many villains exist?"

"If you think about it, Jess.", Captain Marvel said per communicator, because she fought the bald-headed and winged Vulture, the insect-like armor wearing Beetle and the a man with a lion´s head and eagle´s wings called Griffin high in the air. "For one of us, Avenger or not, there are at least ten super-villains!"

"She´s right, I once fought the Sinister Twelve!", Spidey said dry. He dodged with a backwards bow a hit by a armored villain called Whiplash, who got one of Spider-Woman´s bio-energy bolts in his purple mask, revealing nothing but his greenish ponytail. "But that still doesn´t answer who is their leader and what their plan is!" Behind her back the armored Goldbug aimed with his pistol at her, but his attack got stopped by Jessica´s male counterpart as he webbed his gun and punched his helmet into pieces. "Now we´re even.", Spidey said.

"And considering they have a plan: I think their only plan is to kill us. _All_ of us!"

Iron Man landed to their side and asked: "Do you both know where Clint is?"

###

The archer, wearing a complete black sleeveless costume with a purple triangle on his chest and dark purple sunglasses was running towards the building his old friend Quicksilver told him to go, if he wants to see his wife. On his way to it, several villains tried to attack him, but he had an arrow for each of them. One man he identified as Powderkeg was unlucky enough to get one of these things into his eye. But Clint couldn´t care less. When he heard that Bobbi was hurt, he knew he wanted to be by her side.

He finally arrived at the building, which was a skyscraper under construction. On the floor he found some drops of blood. "Oh, shit. Please Bobbi, hold on. I know you can make it. You have always been more tough than me.", he talked to himself. Following the trail of blood and many stairs later he finally heard some voices. Two female and one male. All three of them were very well known to him. "Bobbi!", he yelled.

"Clint?", was one female voice asking. It was really her, weaken by her blood loss, but she had been already patched up by her companions, Natasha Romanov alias Black Widow and Phil Coulson.

Clint and Bobbi ran into each other´s arms and embraced their hug. But suddenly the pain of her wound brought them into reality.

"I told you not to run, Bobbi.", Natasha said calmly as she looked after the wound.

"I´m fine, Nat. It´s not my first rodeo." Clint didn´t left her side and asked: "Who did this? Who hurt you?"

Phil spoke up in his polite manner: "It was a former agent of us. Jason Macendale."

"But now he wears a burning pumpkin head and calls himself Jack O´Lantern...", Natatsha finished, helping her teammate up on her feet. Both women and the man in a gray suit were heading to the next stairway when Hawkeye asked: "Where are you going? If you go up there you´ll become a easy target. I saw flying guys like the Griffin or that old grandpa Spidey mostly faces.

"Lola is up there. We will fly Agent Morse into safety.", Phil answered calmly.

"What the hell is a 'Lola'?"

"My flying car, Mr. Barton. Two months away from SHIELD and you forgot everything from our equipment?", the gray suited man wondered.

###

Jack O´Lantern was a bizarre sight. Considering that men in green armors and flying on gliders, or in his case a motorized brush like witches in fairy tales have, have been something that most New Yorkers have become used to, thanks to several men that Spider-Man fought in his years as a hero. But Jack was more bizarre thanks to his helmet that looked like a Halloween pumpkin on fire. But this couldn´t save him as a moon-shaped shuriken hit him through the helmet and his corpse dropped on a parking car.

"Nice shot, Moon Knight.", Daniel Rand said, wearing his green spandex suit, showing his dragon tattoo on his chest, and his trademark yellow bandana. His fist, glowing in energy, thanks to his channeled chi, broke the jaw of a red-haired woman named Man-Killer. This technique earned him many years ago the mantle of 'Iron Fist'.

The man he talked to was Marc Spector, a former mercenary and now avatar of the Egyptian sun god Khonshu. He wore a complete white suit, covering every inch of his body. His belt was equipped with several moon-shaped weapons. His chest had a moon symbol on it. He also wore a white cape with a cowl. He buried his fists in the bodies of several other costumed men and women like the Shocker or White Rabbit.

Both men were very well trained in different kinds of martial arts. But they still could use some help. "Where´s Nova? He was here a few minutes ago!", Iron Fist complained.

Suddenly some kind of belching sound ripped them out of their actions and something metallic hit the floor in front of them. Danny realized that the metal object was nothing less than Nova´s helmet, covered in his own blood.

"If it comforts you...", a shrieking, skin-crawling voice snarled psychotic. "He was delicious!"

The psychopath who ate the missing hero lashed out with red tendrils which became razor-sharp at his mental command. Iron Fist was still in shock and couldn´t react at the right time, but Moon Knight put him out of harm´s way, only to pay the price by himself. With no chance to recover from the first shock, the second one came around and Iron Fist had to witness how another long time companion got impaled.

"Oops, wrong guy...but I was always a man of second chances. HAHAHA!"

Danny remembered the man in front of him from stories that Spider-Man has told him. His name was Cletus Kassidy, but he prefers his taken name Carnage. Even before he bonded with the alien symbiote, granting him all of his powers he was a known serial killer.

He couldn´t count on more helpful hands, because everyone was involved in his or her own battle. So he had to fight, no matter what the cost will be. His chi was channeled into his deadly fists as he snarled: "Give it another try! But this time you better not miss me!"

Carnage burst out in high-pitched laughter: "How cute. Pajama-boy is getting serious."

Both men rushed towards each other and were ready for their possible last fight!

###

Captain Marvel was fighting high in the air. She could already get rid the old man who looked exactly like the animal he named himself after, the Vulture. Thanks to her he crashed into a wall and lost his consciousness. But her two other attackers, Beetle and Griffin were still fighting her. The armored one of these individuals shot his blasters and rockets at her, but Carol absorbed every hit. She used the energy she had gathered and shot it as a mighty photon-blast at the Beetle, who crashed into the street, knocked out.

The Griffin now grabbed her with his white furred paws and tried to bite her head, but she used her arm to keep his bestial jaws away. "Damn, you could really use a pepper mint.", she remarked as she grabbed his blonde lion-mane and pulled him off her. He recovered mid-air and sent himself with his mighty wings towards her.

"You don´t give up, this has to be said. But in all honesty..." The blonde heroine dodged his tackle and grabbed his tail. "You´re definitely not my type. Too much hair."

She swung him into a water container on the roof of the closest building. "And I appreciate good teeth and less bad breath."

The blonde woman, wearing a mostly blue uniform with red shoulders, gloves and boots and having a yellow star on her chest was still floating when she was hit in the back.

"Hello, Carol! Missed me?", the cunning female voice said.

"Sofen!", Carol shouted at her old nemesis, the former psychologist Karla Sofen, now called Moonstone. She punched the blonde villainess´s chin and kicked her stomach. Moonstone answered by clapping both of her hands on Carol´s ears. She lost all her focus and balance, which made her drop from the sky, several hundred feet down. Her body crashed into the street, nearly into a construction-side a few inches away.

"Who is your boss, Karla? Who coordinates all of you? What´s your plan?", Carol gasped, still struggling with her balance.

"Wow, wow. Hold it, Ms Marvel. Oh, wait you prefer _Captain_ now. Don´t you think your old name is good enough anymore?", Moonstone mocked her enemy.

"Answer...the questions...", the blonde heroine said as she collapsed. Her eardrum must be damaged, she thought.

"Who do you think would be powerful, brilliant and insane enough to come up with such a plan? I would say it´s obvious that only Victor Von Doom could come up with this idea.", the white-golden villainess said in a still mocking tone.

"Doom?" Carol was still on the floor and Moonstone stepped on her. "This really surprises you?"

The heroine tried to stand up, but Karla´s foot pushed her back on the asphalt. She had to ask it: "What´s his goal?"

"Another question with an obvious answer.", her enemy said bored. "To kill you! All of you! But don´t worry, _your_ death will be special."

"Special? What do you mean?"Carol grabbed her enemy´s foot and threw her into the concrete.

Her fists started glowing again and she was ready to hit Karla, but suddenly she stopped. She wasn´t able to move her body. "Turn around, darling.", a male voice with British accent said caring.

Her body did as she was told, but not on Carol´s own will. When she faced the man she was in shock. He wore a classy, expensive suit, that had the same uncommon color as his skin. Carol heard of the Purple Man, or Kilgrave how he was called more frequently.

"Don´t worry, darling. It will only hurt a bit, I promise.", he reassured softly and his right hand went slowly and caring through her shoulder long hair, until he caressed gently her cheek. She was disgusted by the touch of this creepy pervert, but wasn´t able to do something against it. Now his hand reached out for the zipper of her costume. "Only one tiny peek.", his voice stated excited, but still calm. The zipper was now slowly revealing her cleavage, but suddenly another hand stopped his actions.

"Stop it, Kilgrave! That´s not part of the plan!", the crackling voice stated. It was Electro. And he was not alone. He was accompanied by a bigger man, wearing a yellow containment suit with some kind of gas mask. His lenses were shining in a strange green light. It was Chen Lu, the Radioactive Man.

"Such a waste. I would have a lot of fun with her.", Kilgrave´s voice sneered disappointed. Carol was thankful that he was not allowed to play with her. She knew too well from Luke´s wife Jessica Jones what this bastard is able to think of. But still not being able to move and surrounded by four super-villains wasn´t that much better.

Again the Purple Man spoke up: "Now you have to absorb everything that will hit you. Be a good girl."

Moonstone´s light-energy, Electro´s name-giving electricity and Radioactive Man´s radiation hit her all at once. Under normal circumstances this wouldn´t be a big problem. But when her body would start to overload, she could become a human bomb. All her friends were now in a much bigger predicament than they already were in. A burning pain raced through her veins, letting her scream in agony.

"It seems to work, Chen.", Moonstone said.

"Don´t stop, Karla. The same goes for you, Max. Give everything you have!", the green-glowing man said.

Electro simply smiled and absorbed all the electricity in the buildings around him, being able to shot more lightnings at Captain Marvel. Her screams were getting louder and louder.

"When do I have to let her get into the middle of the battlefield?", Kilgrave asked, bored by the drama in front of his eyes.

In all her pain she now realized what her 'special death' was supposed to be like. They wanted her to be the bomb that kills all of the other heroes. Her thoughts raced. She thought about all her closest friends that would die by her, if they hadn´t already fallen on the battlefield. Her best friend Jess, who had been with her every time she needed someone. Or Steve, who was always some kind of older brother to her. Peter, who was sometimes annoying but one of the best and loyal friends anyone could ask for. Wanda, even if they had troubles in the past, but over the last months their friendship strengthen again.

"Okay, Kilgrave. Let her walk slowly to the others.", Moonstone commanded.

"Why walk? She can fly!", the perverted but well-dressed Britain wondered.

"Yes, but it´ll just make sure she won´t lose anything of the energy when she uses her flying powers.", Captain Marvel´s nemesis explained.

"You heard the lady, darling. Go slowly back to your friends.", the strangely skinned man remarked without joy.

"Don´t use so much power now, we don´t want her to explode when we are still around.", Lu pointed out. The radiated Chinese scientist walked forward, still using his powers to slowly overload his opponent. But suddenly he got struck by something from behind.

Carol saw the her two favorite arachnids coming to help her.

"SPIDER-MAN!", Electro yelled furious.

"And don´t forget my better looking counterpart. The amazing Spider-Woman!", the male arachnid said.

"Go away from my friend!", Spider-Woman grunted through her clinched teeth.

Moonstone attacked the raven-haired heroine and commanded Radioactive Man: "You and Kilgrave continue! Rush it, if necessary! Electro, you will get your revenge now!"

"Oh yeah!", the man said with sparkling eyes as he shot bolts in the direction of his long-time hated enemy.

"I could easily control them too, Ms. Sofen.", the Purple Man said.

"But there would be no fun in it!", Moonstone smiled.

"All of you are allowed to have fun, but _I_ have to do a job...", Kilgrave said disappointed.

"Jeez, Max, Max...what happened with us? I thought we had something special. And now you cheat on me with another super-hero? I can understand why you chose her, but why couldn´t you make it a official break-up? At least a text message would´ve been nice..", Spider-Man rambled.

"Oh, I will be so happy when the mouth of you shuts up FOREVER!", the living bolt cried out, shooting a giant wave of electricity at his opponent, who had trouble dodging the masses of lighting coming at him, even with his spider-sense. Jess alias Spider-Woman was in similar trouble against Moonstone, who made herself untouchable when the heroine attacked and using her light-energy to torment her. "Well, well, little spider. You and your 'brother' are still to late." She looked from Jess, who was now in Karla´s grip towards Carol, who still got radiated by Chen and couldn´t break Kilgrave´s mind control.

Jess´ bio-energy hit the blonde woman´s face and she rushed to her friend. She tackled Kilgrave unconscious.

At the same time Spider-Man lured Electro to a hydrant and opened it. "Need a drink?", he quipped as his enemy was hit by the liquid. "All these years and he still falls for that."

"HA, IT´S TOO LATE!", Moonstone´s voice cackled joyful.

Spider-Man looked to his friends and saw Carol changing. He swung towards her and placed his hands on her shoulders. But he quickly had to take them off her as her body emitted flames. Even her skin became dark red and her eyes changed to white glowing light.

"Peter- I can´t stop it anymore- it hurts." Saying that her expression was worried would be an understatement. "You and Jess- please go- safe yourself-" Flaming tears came out of her eyes as she went to the sky in high-speed. She could hear Jess calling her name, crying.

###

Several minutes before: The three current and the only ex-agent of SHIELD were finally on the roof of the building under construction. Black Widow could see the battlefield the Times Square had become. She saw Iron Man caught in the name-giving weapons of his old enemy Whiplash, Captain America and Scarlet Witch were struggling against a being of pure energy she knew as the Living Laser. Quicksilver was having a race against Whirlwind, moving in a green tornado and wearing a huge green helmet with two horns on it. Hulk was still in his brawl with the Juggernaut. She also saw Luke Cage fighting Carnage. On the concrete between them laid the bloody mask of Iron Fist. There was so much happening. Too much to catch it in one peek.

Hawkeye supported Mockingbird as they reached Phil´s red cabriolet he named Lola. Lola was no ordinary car. With a button 'she' was able to fly and had many hidden weapons in 'her' interior.

Bobbi placed herself on the seat on the right. Clint looked to Phil and Natasha and said with a nod:

"Thank you for taking care of her."

"Well, it´s not like we had to force her.", Widow said playfully with a smile towards Mockingbird, who simply shrugged and said somewhat defeated but still honest: "Thank you.."

"We will return to the Times Square and help the others. You two go to the coordinates I gave you. This is a secret SHIELD facility HYDRA and the villains haven´t found...yet. You should be safe there and medics will take much more professional care of Agent Morse´s injuries.", Coulson said friendly.

"Alright. And you have no problem that we´ll have to leave you alone?", Hawkeye said with a bad conscience.

"Go, Clint. We´ll do it!", Nat said as she already walked back to the stairway. Phil was on her tail as Clint and Bobbi took off.

"We have to hurry, Coulson. We lost many more in the time we lost here."

"No kidding!"

Suddenly they heard heavy screams. Screams of pain and agony.

"What was that?", Bobbi asked, still hovering together with her husband over the building.

"We lost another one...", Clint remarked saddened. Without any warning a flying woman covered in flames passed them. She looked at them in shock and fear, shouting: "NO! FLEE!"

From the roof of the building Widow and Coulson could witness everything, the red-haired agent even recognized the voice: "Carol?"

A bright light forced both agents to close their eyes. Heat was felt everywhere. Sounds of rustling concrete and crashing metal rang in their ears. A flying piece of metal even hit the former Russian spy and current Avenger in her face. Blood was running down the right side of her face and especially her eye was badly hurt.

"Agent Romanov! Are you okay?" She could barely hear Phil.

"Clint and Bobbi...are they..."

"Dead...both of them...", his defeated voice explained.

###

Captain America and Scarlet Witch got rid of the Living Laser. But they were now under attack by Boomerang, Joystick and Crimson Dynamo, who was less mobile thanks to the damage Captain Marvel did to his armor. These three villains were not a big problem for these two, especially for Wanda who simply tossed them away with her telekinesis. "Good work, Wanda!", Cap said.

"Do you expect anything less from me, Steve?", she answered, which made him smile a bit.

A giant explosion only one street away caught their attention. They saw how a skyscraper still under construction got partly destroyed by it. On the street beneath it they eyed both arachnid Avengers, fighting Moonstone and Radioactive Man, with a knocked out Electro on the left and a unconscious Purple Man on the right.

Before anything was done Cap suddenly felt a burning pain in his left shoulder. Wanda yelled his name and tried to help him on his feet. His wound was heavenly bleeding.

"Stand up, Captain. You do not wish to die on your knees, do you?", a strange metallic voice said, filled with arrogance.

Cap and Wanda looked from where the voice came. They saw five individuals standing there.

One was female, green hair that covered the left half of her face, wearing a green HYDRA-uniform.

A male one was big and bald-headed, having a crane in his hand and wearing a white jacket and and purple pants. He was dressed like he had a business meeting or was ready for a visit of the opera.

A much taller male was gray-skinned with blue stripes on his head and blue lips. His armor was also blue with some silver stripes. The fourth individual was not human. It was a robot with a insect-like looking head. Red glowing light came out it´s eyes and mouth. The last one, the one who talked to both Avengers wore a gray armor that covered his whole body. Covering the torso of his armor was a green garment with a green cape and cowl.

Steve could name them all: Ophelia Sarkissian alias Madame Hydra or Viper, Wilson Fisk alias Kingpin, En Sabah Nuhr alias Apocalypse, the former A.I. Ultron and the last one was Doctor Doom, ruler of Latveria:

"But the rest of the world will kneel before DOOM!"

###

The first chapter ends here.

This was just the beginning of a huge story.

The next following chapters won´t be that...let´s say gory. For now.

Like I said in the intro: This will be a bit darker story, for which I took many sources as inspiration.

Feel free to review.

Until next time.


	2. Chapter 2

Hello everyone and welcome back to 'New World Order'.

Hope you liked the first chapter.

 **Chapter 2: Five years later: The Triskelion heist**

 _I am Uatu, the Watcher. Our ancient race watches over many worlds. Worlds that are similar, but different. Many events on all these worlds happen under different circumstances, but parallel to it under the same circumstances. We vowed to only watch, but not to interfere. Our only desire is to study all races in all universes on all planets. This time my eyes are now on a Earth which had made tragic losses. Many of their greatest heroes have fallen in various battles on the same day. This was five years ago._

 _The world itself is now divided into five kingdoms: the former North-American continent is now the Kingdom of America, ruled by Wilson Fisk and his wife Vanessa. South-America is now a lifeless jungle, slowly turning into a metal environment called Ultronpolis, named after it´s ruler, the living machine Ultron. Africa has become a colossal desert named the Domain. Only some villages and towns were spared by it´s cruel leader Apocalypse. The eastern parts of Asia are now in the hands of HYDRA, a ruthless terror organization that originated from Hitler´s science unit in World War II. Their current leader, and thus leader of the HYDRA-States is the woman called Viper. Europe and the western parts of Asia have been renamed to the Latverian Empire, ruled under the iron fist of the ruthless Doctor Doom._

 _The last two continents, Australia and Antarctica have become lifeless. The Oceanic continent has been destroyed by nuclear warheads. It´s now a wasteland without any organic lifeforms. The cold continent is shared by the new world leaders and used as one of their prisons, if any poor soul is ever spared in a direct confrontation._

 _The dictatorship of these five cruel personalities chokes out all hope of a world in peace. But every shadow needs some light to exist. And this light are some heroes that survived the day that became known as the last day of heroism._

 _###_

The Triskelion. Once known as the biggest facility of SHIELD, stationed in Washington DC. The offices of all North-American representatives in the highest ranks were here. Even the senior director and member of the World Safety Council had his office in the highest floor. In a sad twist of irony this building has become now one of the biggest facilities in the clutches of one of the men who let the Council look like a colossal joke five years ago.

The building itself was on an artificial island with only one bridge leading to it. Heavy tanks and armored vehicles were passing it as they reached a gate, guarded by men wearing black armors. In their holsters were guns visible.

"It´s like you said, Victor. Two guards armed to their teeth. These Thorns conquered everything. Kingpin takes it really serious that America is now his Kingdom.", Black Widow said, looking through her long-distance goggles. Her red hair was now a lot shorter, but still long enough to cover her right half of the face partly. Instead of her typical black costume, she had a dark gray skintight outfit with a crimson hourglass-logo on her back. She kept her golden gauntlets and belt. Her right eye was also covered by an black eye-patch. It was a loss she made when she was hit five years ago by the piece of metal from the explosion that killed her friends Clint and Bobbi. And seemingly Carol, too. But she didn´t lost anything of her efficiency she was always known for.

She turned towards other men and women that were sitting with her in cover, behind some trees only few yards away from the bridge. The man she referred to as Victor was fully named Victor Creed, also known as the former super-villain Sabretooth. He had long, dark blonde hair tied up to a ponytail. His cheeks were covered by dark blonde sideburns. On each on his fingers he had cat-like claws instead of fingernails and his corner teeth were also sharpen like these of a giant cat.

On his right was a woman in her late-twenties with short blackish-brown hair, wearing a white variation of a typical SHIELD uniform and two massive gauntlets at her hands. She was like Natasha a former agent, Daisy Johnson, codenames 'Quake' or 'Skye'.

Another much younger woman was part this group. She had long, black hair and wore similar black jeans. Her boots were in a more metallic looking black, similar to the sleeves that ended around her small, but still toned biceps. The upper body of the young woman was simply covered with a short black and white striped top, revealing her midsection. She was a former member of the X-Men, Laura Kinney alias X-23.

To her left was a man dressed in black biker clothes with some dark purple stripes on it´s sides. His face was hidden inside his completely black helmet, fitting his appearance. He only called himself Overdrive and was a former villain, too.

The final individual in this strange group was completely covered in a dark red and black spandex suit, with a belt around his waist that was holding two guns. On his back were two sheaths, each one of them contained a deadly katana. His name was –

"The one and only, the merc with a mouth, the guy who won´t die, Wade Winston Wilson...Deadpool!"

Suddenly his throat was cut open by a metal blade, coming out of X-23´s hand.

"It´ll take a while until your vocal cords heal again.", she snarled, annoyed by his babbling behavior.

"Thank you, Laura...", Widow added. "Okay. If our mole is correct, Fisk hides a weapon inside the Triskelion that could give us finally the advantage we´ve been waiting so long for. We have to part into three groups: Skye and Overdrive get one of the vehicles for our escape and use their computer system against them. Laura comes with me. We two find whatever Fisk is storing in there. Victor and Wade, you two keep an eye on the guards and alarm us if they could suspect our present- where´s Wade?", she suddenly wondered.

Everyone looked around, but Deadpool was not found until Skye sighed: "Oh, no..."

They looked all to the bridge and saw him walking casually towards the guards.

"Hey, sweeties! I´m Deadpool. Probably you already heard of me. I mean _who_ hasn´t since my movie came out. Ryan Reynolds did a terrific job, Oscar-worthy just because it was _le moi_."

Confused by his actions, his teammates simply sat behind the bushes, only watching what was about to happen.

"Shouldn´t we help him?", Overdrive asked but Natasha simply silenced him with a wave of her hand.

On the bridge the crimson-black merc came closer to both guards. His unhealthy sounding voice continued: "Just saying out of pure politeness: knowing your names would be nice, too. Let me guess: Ernie and Bert? Simon and Garfunkel?"

One of the guards suddenly snarled in a dead voice: "You better leave, freak!" They raised their weapons and started to hunt Deadpool into the forest.

With a high-pitched shriek he ran and yelled in his communicator: "Do it, guys!"

Black Widow now realized that he started his own distraction just to help them. "It´s pointless what he´s doing. We won´t even use this entrance...whatever."

She gave the others the command to do as they were briefed several moments ago.

"He´s endangering the whole mission, Nat.", X-23 complained. Sabretooth simply grunted: "It´s Wade, what do you expect?"

The bestial ex-villain hid himself in the forests surrounding the Triskelion, watching out for any other potential guards. He witnessed how they caught his long-time acquaintance and handcuffed him.

The masked merc ranted as the two armored men dragged him to the tower: "You _do_ know I´m not afraid to cut off my own arms just to get away from you?"

One of the men sneered from beneath his helmet: "Not if these handcuffs nullify your healing powers."

"Really? What a lucky coincidence this is for the plot of this story..."

"Shut up!", the other one commanded.

Sabretooth talked into his communicator to Widow: "Wade got caught by these goons. Should I attack?"

"No, Victor. Let them bring him inside. If you assault them now they will probably start searching for us."

"Aren´t they already doing exactly that?"

"Probably. But they will start searching in the forests. So take good cover. If they only find you and nothing will come out of your mouth, the mission will still be safe to continue."

"And if our walking talking idiot starts to talk?", he asked.

At first there was no answer. But after a while he heard her voice stating: "Well, that wouldn´t be good..." She ended the talk and left Sabretooth alone in his thoughts.

He grunted to himself "Thanks for stating out the obvious." and vanished between trees.

###

Natasha lead Skye, Overdrive and X-23 to a small hill made of massive stone and covered by several plants growing on it. Her hands were searching something between the green leafs.

"Ehm...I don´t think it´s the right time to get touchy with...a stone wall...", Skye remarked somewhat confused.

"You think she had a secret crush on Ben Grimm?", Overdrive whispered.

Suddenly a clicking noise was heard and parts of the hill separated themselves to reveal a secret tunnel. X-23 walked into it and said extremely bored: "A secret entrance. I´m _totally_ surprised..."

Black Widow made a presenting motion towards the other former SHIELD-Agent and the ex-villain.

They followed the mutant into the catacombs and Overdrive asked: "What makes you so sure that they won´t find us in here?"

They walked under some rusty pipes and some lamps that were so dusty that their light barely lit the tunnel.

"Because that tunnel was never noted in any file of SHIELD. It has to be a unpleasant miracle if Kingpin´s Thorns knew about it. Only Fury, Hill and myself knew of it´s existence.", Natasha explained as they reached a ladder. Again the black-haired mutant went forward. "How convenient for us.", Skye chuckled as she climbed after X-23.

"Ehm, Ms. Romanov, ma´am...", Overdrive raised his finger as he wanted to participate in the class. "Yes, `Drive...", she sighed annoyed and hang her head down. "Well, Ms. Romanov...I´m not that well trained in combat like you. Or Ms. Johnson. Or Ms. Kinney. Or-"

"Get to the point.", she nearly sang.

"The point is...what should I do when we get into a confrontation? There would be no scenario I could be helpful..." The tips of index fingers met several times in a nervous manner.

The red-haired heroine rested her hand on his shoulder and encouraged him: "You won´t get into any fight, we will make that sure."

Overdrive was still nervous, but now he was also a bit more brave as he climbed the ladder: "Thanks, ma´am."

As she followed him she added: "Make sure you won´t miss the next training session our leader and I will prepare if we get back home."

"Talking about him: what would he say if we leave Deadpool here? I mean this guy is nothing but trouble!", Skye said.

Natasha shook her head: "He won´t tolerate that. He would move heaven and hell to save him, even when he can´t stand him, too. But he is useful and we can use every helping hand." They walked to an iron gate.

"And even if Wade wouldn´t be a help for us...it´s still a life he thinks is worth saving."

She pressed some buttons as Overdrive said to X-23: "He even recruited me and Ol´Fang out there. And we were villains once. Okay, we weren´t part of this massacre five years ago, so probably that helped." The gate opened and Widow gave the signal to split up. Her and Laura went to the left, while Daisy and the only male in the group went to the right. "We meet outside in twenty minutes.", the combat experienced red-head said.

"Understood!", was Skye´s answer.

She and her companion headed to the hangar exactly the way Widow described it per communicator. They avoided the cameras, which were surprisingly only three on the whole way to their target.

When they reached the hangar they saw the vehicles that passed the bridge again and men and women wearing either black armors like the guards that caught Deadpool or had simple street-wear. All of them had some kind of heat emitting from their skin. Even some clouds of smoke were visible sometimes, coming from her glowing skin.

"Ohhh, these guys seem to be literal hotheads..", Overdrive whispered somewhat afraid.

"It looks like they have been infected with Extremis, some kind of super soldier serum. But I thought it wasn´t stabilized enough for any successful attempts and got destroyed.", Skye wondered.

"Sorry if it´s disrespectful to say, but it seems kinda obvious they found something of it and _were_ successful...", the helmet wearing man dryly remarked.

She glared at him and said: "Seriously, _why_ are you here? You cannot fight! Has our leader put you in our little group just to motivate us to finish it faster? I thought Deadpool is the guy for that!"

"That...that kinda hurt...Ms. Johnson...", he said defeated.

Skye didn´t care and watched the goons, stating: "When Extremis is this secret weapon Fisk stores here, we´re in bigger trouble than we initially thought." She eyed a console, not far away from her position. Overdrive was told to stay where he is as she sneaked to it. Without being located by one of the so called Thorns she used her computer skills to gain secretly access on the camera system.

When she had full control, she created a loop on every other computer system in the building, expect the one she was using. She activated her communicator and called Widow.

"I´m in their system now, Widow. I´ll guide you to the laboratory. But I have to warn you: it seems that these Thorns are powered by Extremis!"

"I thought it was destroyed?", came the voice from the other end.

"Well, obviously not...", Daisy said. "Take caution!"

###

"We will.", Natasha answered and told X-23: "Our problems have become bigger."

"Bigger?", X asked. "Is that even possible?"

"When Skye is right about Kingpin having fed his henchmen with the worst drug ever created, our problems will multiply." Both women hid behind a wall in the shadows and waited until Skye gave them confirmation that the way was free.

Natasha continued: "It looks like that all Thorns in this building have Extremis running through their veins. Back when he was still alive, Tony told me how he had trouble with just _one_ of those guys. And his version of the serum was not stabilized! If they really have this stuff in their body in a way it functions, we...well..."

Again they took cover. Skye told them that there were no guards and their target was only two corridors away. X-23 spoke up: "I faced many monsters, junkies won´t harm me..."

"These junkies will! Their bodies create incredible heat. The first tests turned the injected ones into bombs that vaporized bystanders. I´m pretty sure that even your adamantium skeleton won´t be spared." Laura shrugged it off with a grunt.

Finally they reached the room they were searching. At least the door leading to it. The mole that extracted the information about a deadly weapon in the clutches of the Kingpin told Natasha and the leader of the last remaining heroes, that this room was once a laboratory which was used to research alternate types of energy, like cosmic rays and use them as sources for different machines, or even weapons. It could have changed the world to the better or worst. In all her years as an agent she was never down here. But she knew the head scientist of this department, Erik Selvig too well. A man that would have never used these types of energy for deadly weapons. Not at his own free will of course.

Unlucky for both trained killers was that two street clothes wearing individuals guarded the room, one male and one female. They could hear their banter.

"What I´m saying is: if Doom is really _that_ smart, why does he share the world with four other persons.", the female said.

"I don´t know. Maybe he just had a generous phase in his life when this decision was made?", the male answered somewhat annoyed.

"Doom? Generous? I heard other stuff!"

"You _really_ want to discuss that? Be glad that it is like it is. I´m not fond of the idea being run over by some Doombots and AIM-guys."

"Hmm, you´re right...Who do think would win a battle? Wrecker or Rhino?"

He sighed: "See...talks like this are the reason why we´re just henchmen and no super-villains..."

Black Widow and X-23 were still in cover and waited for the right opportunity to strike. The red-head whispered into her communicator: "Skye. Could you cause a fake alarm somewhere?"

"I thought you would never ask. Take cover!"

Like they were told, both women hid themselves behind some cables and metal bars. They were waiting until the female of the Thorns received a call: "Yes?...Mhm...okay, we´ll look..."

She turned to the male Thorn: "The sensors in Sector 3 registered an intruder. We´re supposed to take a look." He nodded and both headed to the mentioned location.

"Good work, Skye.", Natasha said leaving her cover. She and X-23 now walked to the door. Natasha again pressed some buttons, but without any effect.

"Wait, I´ll make it...", Skye said per communicator. After a short while the door opened itself which was monotonously remarked by Laura: "Open Sesame..."

"Close the door behind us."

Skye did as Natasha told her. Now the former Avenger and her mutant companion were in the laboratory. Her eyes instantly caught a huge glass tube glowing in a purple light. This tube was connected with everything that seemingly provides anything in this building with energy. Pipes, cables and wires from all directions were leading into capsules that drained their power from whatever was in this tube.

"What. Is. That?", Natasha nearly choked on her words. "Is that the weapon?"

"If 'yes' it´s alive...", X answered, again in a monotone voice.

"What makes you think that it´s alive?", Widow asked confused.

Now Laura showed for the first time some expressions on her face since this mission started. Her face told Natasha that she felt uncomfortable. Her answer told the ex-agent why: "I was created, _born_ in an scientific environment like this. I saw many of those tubes and in each case a living human being was in it."

Natasha could see how hard this sight was for the much younger woman. It brought back bad memories of her childhood. If being created as a deadly assassin in a lab and artificially aged into being a, back then fourteen year old girl counts as some form of childhood. The arachnid-themed woman slowly approached the tube. Some kind of haze steamed the glass up and made it impossible to peek inside the tube. With her right hand Black Widow cleared a small potion of it and made a confusing sight.

Inside the tube was some being made of pure energy. It´s whole body lit in a purple light that made it look like a living lava lamp. Judging from it´s body shape it seemed to be a female humanoid light-being. Natasha still stared in shock until it´s head suddenly moved and gazed directly into her eyes. She made a quick step back and said: "It´s definitely alive!"

" _It_?", X wondered.

"I don´t know what this is, but it´s definitely the power source of the Triskelion. And it doesn´t seem like it´s weaken by all the power drained from it."

"A living battery?" Now Laura risked a short look into the tube and made eye-contact with it´s content. "Looks like a girl..."

"Yeah, but I´m not sure we should consider it as a person. It´s possible that this is some kind of A.I., similar to Ultron before he became a 'him'...and dictator of South-America." She checked the wires and cables. Her eyes still trying to figure out which cable leads to which socket, she pointed to the tube: "We need to get it outta here."

"Ehm, we see the same things, right? Have you seen how big it is? We can´t put it in your belt or the pockets of my jeans!"

"Yeah...I think we should let the boys have some fun, too." Again she talked to Skye: "Can you locate Wade?"

"We´re considering to save that lunatic?", she asked somewhat disgusted.

"Yes. And why not send another lunatic to save him? Tell Victor that he will get finally some action."

###

" _Lay down your arms, surrender! You know, you´ll never get outta here!_ "

"Is he still singing?", one of the armored man asked annoyed.

"Hear for yourself!", the other exclaimed totally stressed out.

They were in an old interrogation room of the Triskelion. Still his hands tied with handcuffs that made it impossible for him to use his powers, Deadpool sat at the table and was guarded by two Thorns. These were not the same as the both he distracted on the bridge, but they wore similar armors, minus the helmets. He could see their pulsating, glowing veins.

"No sense for some classics? It´s 'Lay down your arms' by Asia. Not the continent, the British band. I like to sing it now, mostly because the author of the story listened to it when he was writing this scene and needed a way to start it...", he said in a matter-of-fact tone.

"Do you have any idea, what he just said?", one guard asked, which was answered with a shaking head by the other one.

"Sooooo, how long do I have to wait until the story-telling allows it to bring in one of the big guys that is supposed to torture me in the most gruesome ways imaginable and let me wish that I would die thousands deaths...again. This comes from the healing factor, you know. You die, but not really. Sometimes it´s fun, but other times it´s hard to get your boys back were they belong, before you look like that guy from the second Men in Black movie."

One of the armored men became impatient and let his left foot move up and down.

Deadpool didn´t stop: "So, who will be chosen to hurt me? Doctor Octopus? No, kinda too obvious.

MODOK? Hmph, not threatening enough. Moonstone? That won´t be torture for me, I guarantee that, hehe. I personally think Wrecker is not qualified for that...What about Jack O´Lantern? Wait, no, he died in the first chapter..."

The door opened, A man in Deadpool´s size entered, wearing a dark blue and crimson skintight body suit covering everything expect his lower half of the face. On his suit were also yellow lightning bolts and his eyes hid behind red goggles.

Deadpool yelled furious and disappointed: "Speed Demon? This is the best you could do? Some C-class goof, that once called himself the Whizzer? By the way, one of the stupidest names ever. I die by the hands of _this-_ " His hand waved towards the target of his rant. "And Iron Fist and Moon Knight get slaughtered by Carnage in Chapter one. This isn´t fair." He started to cry.

Speed Demon ignored the words of his prisoner and started to talk: "What get´s you here,

Mr. Wilson? And where are your friends?"

The interrogated suspect leaned forwards: "I got here by a stupid decision I was supposed to make. See, nothing of this really happens. It´s just part of the fantasy of some guy who is sitting on his computer and typing some words to get it off his chest." The interrogator wasn´t pleased by this for him confusing answer. Deadpool suddenly felt several quick punches at the back his head.

"Ouch, HEY! Not fair! Moving so fast that nobody sees it and hurting a handcuffed man. Even without these things it wouldn´t be fair!", the merc yelled angered.

"I ask again...", the speedster snarled. "Why are you here? And where are your friends located."

"I´m here in this room because I did something that was totally unnecessary to the plan. But it was fun, I admit that. My 'friends' how you call them are...no, telling you would be just too easy.", he mocked with a deep voice.

The villain snapped, hitting the table with both fists. As he hit it his fists emitted flames for a short moment, which shocked Deadpool: "Dayum, this trick is new!" He looked Speed Demon in the face and saw his skin glowing orange, like the guards. "Oi, you also participated in this Extremis project? Seems to be the newest trend."

Suddenly the expression of the glowing men changed from anger to confusion, again.

"Extremis?", Demon asked.

Deadpool burst out in laughter: "Wait, wait, wait...you´re telling me that you don´t know what this magma serum running through your veins is? Seriously, can I get MODOK now as my tormentor? At least the big head knows what he´s doing..."

Now the man that hit the table started unexpectedly to grin: "A serum? You wish..."

"What´s that supposed to mean?"

"When you find out what powers all of us, you would wish it was just a 'serum'!"

Deadpool gulped hard.

###

Sabretooth was still hiding in the bushes. Grim and irritated he stared at the Triskelion as he was talking into his communicator: "Let me summarize: Natasha and Laura found a ' _someone_ ' and plan to bring it out. And they ask me to get Deadpool out and fight my way through some guys that are powered by Extremis? Yeah, just another day in paradise..."

Skye on the other end sighed and explained: "Listen, Vic...I have no idea how this is supposed to work, but I can still guide you to Wade and find a way out for all of you. ´Drive and I will prepare everything for our escape..."

"Can´t we just say I _tried_ to save Wade but failed? Would things make a lot easier in the future..."

"Viiiic...", she said in a reminding tone.

"Yeah, yeah. I´ll do what I can...", he grunted defeated.

"I knew we could count on our big kitty.", she said joyful with a note of sugar.

Still unconvinced and in a bad mood the bestial man rushed through the bushes until he stood very close at the side of the bridge. The two guards who caught the insane merc before, were still patrolling around the entrance area. Victor thought out a plan how he could enter the tower without getting into a fight with these men. They could easily overpower him, simply by their masses.

At his feet he found small stones which he picked up. He threw the first one on the bridge. Simple minds like the guards have been, paid attention to it´s sound. When they wondered what the sound was, Sabretooth threw another one, this time with a bit more force behind it. Quickly he vanished into the bushes. He went not far and climbed onto a tree, where he would wait for his prey. And his plan really worked as perceived. One of the guards went to the bushes and followed the traces Victor left. "They really fell for it...", he thought.

When the guard stood under the tree, the former villain positioned himself over his would-be-victim. He eyed a weak spot in the back of his armor and thought about to use it for his advantage.

In a matter of a few seconds the big man landed nearly soundless behind his victim, buried his clawed mutant paws into the back of the man and ripped out his spine in one fluid motion.

The Thorn wasn´t even able to make a sound. But suddenly the blonde man´s hand burned. The flame was not big, but it was a painful experience. Sabretooth knew what flames felt like. Thanks to his healing factor he survived it many times, especially when he fought other individuals with these kind of powers like Firestar, Human Torch or Pyro. But these flames were different. It felt like they weren´t only burning the flesh from his hand, but also parts of his inner self. Some persons would say his soul, but Sabretooth wanted to avoid that word in his thoughts.

He suppressed his own screams of pain to avoid any unwanted attention. It took only a few seconds that felt like an eternity until the flames stopped burning. But without any anticipation something looking like a blue flame shot out of the dead body. But before Victor could clearly define what he has seen, it vanished with a howling voice into the forest.

"That...was nothing usual...", he wondered. He peeked at his right hand that looked like a steak which has been on the grill for far too much time. It still hurt, which was unusual like the thing he saw.

But he lost no time and took the armor from the dead body and wore it by himself. His victim was hidden behind some trees.

Holding the gun by his side he walked out of the green environment and headed to the other guard.

On his way to the entrance he whispered into his communicator: "I´m dressed like one of them. Hope they won´t notice. But there is more: are you sure it´s Extremis? I came into contact with one of them and it was kinda...freaky..."

"Don´t worry. Everything about it is freaky.", Natasha´s voice answered.

Sabretooth grunted agreeing but still not sure if he should be convinced by this. The gate at the entrance of the Triskelion was now not only guarded by the other man that caught Deadpool. Two more Thorns wearing black armors were now standing besides him. The one that already stood there when Widow´s team arrived asked: "Have you found something?"

Victor simply shook his head to avoid talking. He was already lucky enough that the helmet covered his face, so getting caught by his voice would be unlucky.

"Okay then, we´ll take over.", one of the new guards said. "Your shift is over."

" _What a lucky bastard you are, Creed!_ ", Victor thought. He and the other men went to the locker room. The mutant used the opportunity when his 'colleague' had to visit the porcelain department and walked, still wearing his armor through the corridors of the former SHIELD-tower.

"Daisy, have you visual on me?", he asked.

The young woman answered his call: "It´s hard to say. You look with this suit like the rest of these goons."

Sabretooth used his claws and scratched the front of his chest. On his black gear were now four deep cuts, that were supposed to help Skye to identify him on camera.

"That was kinda clever...", the hacker and Inhuman said impressed.

"Why so surprised? Many people seem to forget that I was once an trained agent, too.", he grunted, making his way to the elevator. "Okay, on which floor is our annoying friend?"

"Fifth one. In one of SHILED´s interrogation rooms. I´ll guide you, big man.", Skye said.

"Show me the way, Jiminy Cricket."

###

"Ever heard of the black scroll?", James Sanders alias Speed Demon asked the cuffed man in front of him, both sitting at the table.

Deadpool was getting impatient. He wasted his time with a bad guy that hardly qualified himself as a real threat among other super-villains. Well, at least he did in the past. But now Wade wasn´t so sure if this was still the case.

"Has it something to do with the 'Elder Scrolls'. If _yes_ , there is a high possibility I once heard of it."

"Again, nobody knows what you´re talking about-"

"Oh, I know, I spent much time playing Skyrim!", one of the guards standing behind Speed Demon interrupted the villain, which was silently answered with a angry glare. The Thorn was quiet now and let the speedster continue: " _Nobody_ knows what you´re talking about. Like you don´t know about the black scroll."

"Sounds a awful lot like Santa´s naughty list.", Wade quipped.

"The comparison is kinda fitting.", the costumed man in front of the merc said bluntly. "But instead of getting punished, we get a present. A huge present. Kingpin used it once to take advantage of a man for his own goals against his will. A really powerful man, that was feared by many of us."

"I wouldn´t be surprised if the writer would come up with Hypno-Hustler or D-Man...", Deadpool murmured.

"I´m sure you met him before he died.", the interrogator grinned mischievously. "Does the name 'Johnny Blaze' ring some bells?"

"Yeah, bonded with a demonic entity called Zarathos. Bounty hunter of the devil. Spirit of vengeance. Liked it to wrap up really bad boys with his chain yada yada..." Suddenly Deadpool burst out: "OMG! Don´t tell me this becomes one of these creepy smut stories with some bondage fetish elements! The world is not ready for 'Fifty Shades of Blaze'!"

Suddenly Speed Demon´s skin started to glow even stronger until it vanished. Smell of burnt flesh filled the room. The air in it also heated up. And Deadpool stared into the flaming skull of the man he faced.

"Well, now the Whizzer isn´t so ridiculous, isn´t he?", the now fear-inducing deep voice of the villain asked.

"Okay, now I _wish_ this would have become some smut story with chain-bondage..."

The door opened again and another guard entered the room. He placed himself between the other two. But unlike them he still wore a helmet. His movements were at first steady and calm, but when he peeked at Speed Demon and his now really name-fitting appearance, he seemed more cautious.

"Why are you here?", the flaming voice sneered deeply.

"Ehm...I´ve been told you called for me?", the deep voice nearly grunted.

Deadpool looked questioning at the guard: "I know that voice..." His expression beneath his mask became happily. So did his snarly voice: "Hey, Victor. You came to save me!"

"What?", Speed Demon cried out.

Before the guards could react, the helmet wearing man buried his clawed hands into their necks and ripped of their heads. He roared in pain because his hands caught fire as blue flames howled through the corridors, coming out of the killed men. Ignoring the pain as good as it was possible, he said angered: "Wilson! You freaking moron! I´m trying to save you but you-" The blurry fist of the flaming villain interrupted his rant, bringing him to his knees. The helmet which protected his head flew off and made his face now visual for his attacker. But even in his possessed state the speedster seemed afraid of the man in front of him: "Sabretooth? You?"

"Exactly!", the man in question snarled and grabbed his opponent by his legs, slamming him through the glass behind Deadpool. Behind it was the merc´s equipment, which he quickly made his possession again. "You saved me, Simba! You cannot live without some Deadpool in your life, huh?"

Both walked out as the bestial man snarled: "You endangered the whole mission! At first this useless and senseless act on the bridge! And now you blow off my cover!"

"To be honest: I was kinda hoping he would use his penance stare on you! But it seems like 'once a loser, always a loser' is Whizzie´s game." Both rushed to the end of the corridor and had to take a turn to the left.

"You wanted me to get killed? By what?", Sabretooth furiously yelled.

"Penance stare! Lucky for you the writer didn´t let our friend use it on you. These guys are not powered by Extremis. Kingpin used some old piece of toilet paper and split up the demon that gave Ghost Rider his powers, Now pieces of him power the Thorns, and Speed Demon is one of them."

Sabretooth grunted: "Okay, it´s worse. No surprise. But why did you try to get me killed?"

Now Deadpool´s voice became uncommonly dark and serious: "For Vanessa..."

No words were spoken until they reached the elevator. Sabretooth now got a call by Widow: "Natasha? I got Wade! Where are you?"

"Still in the lab.", she answered somewhat exhausted. "You need to come. We have the tube with this purple light-thing in it. But the only way out without getting caught was an elevator."

"Come up to the fifth floor. We´ll await you. Daisy, lead me to their position. Wade, are you coming?"

"You know what? This time my distraction won´t be pointless!", he quipped as he pulled out his guns. "Wade. What are you thinking?"

"You help our ladies, while I´ll try to hold the Thorns back from you!"

"And what if you get caught again?"

"Then I can only hope your guilt towards me is big enough to save my ass again. Would be a shame if the author would lose one of his most popular comic-relief characters in this story."He raced around the corner and started shooting with a battle cry that sounded for Victor like "Leeroy Jenkins!"

The bestial mutant rushed through the floor he was on, always in contact with Skye.

"Daisy, how long?", he asked annoyed and impatient.

She answered him in a thrilled tone:"Don´t worry, tiger. You´re there in three...two..."

The door opened and Widow and X-23 came out with a tube containing the suspected 'weapon' of Fisk.

"You found us!", Natasha exclaimed. "We need you to carry this. You´re the only one of us physically able to do so."

"Sometimes I get the feeling I´m just a pet for you...", he grunted, which gave Laura a rare smile on her face. "We won´t be able to get out without being in the main center of attraction.", the red-head said. "What do you suggest?", the blonde man asked, now carrying the tube on his right shoulder.

"That we need a _bigger_ eye-catcher. Overdrive, are you ready?"

"Yes, Ms. Romanov, ma´am.", he answered somewhat shy.

###

"Say 'Hello' to my little friend!", Deadpool yelled as he shot down several Thorns. But most of them were always back on their feet after a while, depending where Wade´s bullets hit them.

After a while he thought: "A nice plot-hole for infinite ammunition would be nice. Why are cheat-codes exclusive to video games?"

He took his katana´s out of their sheaths and went over to close combat. He cut off the hands of some men and women attacking him: "Sorry, I have to _disarm_ you." Another felt the steel of the merc´s blade in his head: "3D is really some _cutting edge_ technology!"

But the corridor filled itself with more and more Thorns, letting Deadpool no other choice expect fleeing. At the end of the corridor was, like everywhere in the building a huge window. He ran towards and prepared himself to shatter it. "This is gonna hurt!"

He jumped through it and scattered it into little pieces as he flew downwards to the concrete, ready for his coming healing process. Well, at least this was how Deadpool planned it. Instead of this, the glass of the window did not break and the merc dodged off like he jumped against a trampoline. The only thing broken was his nose: "Ohhh, come ON! Is there any love for Wade Wilson? Who builds a tower for an agency, guarding people world-wide and securing everything that is top secret in here with some bulletproof glass? This makes too much sense for my short thinking mind..." He positioned his nose back how it was and rushed to another corridor, still having the Thorns on his tail.

Suddenly the building was shaking. "AHHHH, GODZILLA!", he yelled. His ears caught loud rustling noises from many floors down below. When he took a look out of the window he could see a colossal tank, colored pitch-black with some dark green patterns on it. It´s pipe looked more like a futuristic rail gun. The chains of it´s wheels were covered in small spikes. It also seemed like it had some kind of cannons on both sides of the pipe, looking like Gatling guns.

It came out of the hangar and Overdrive´s voice could be heard nearly all around the Triskelion,

yelling victoriously: "SAY 'HELLO' TO MY LITTLE FRIEND!"

"Hey, I said it first!", Deadpool stated angered.

###

Black Widow smiled when the ground was shaking and noises of rustling concrete, metal and glass could be heard. "Was this part of your plan?", Sabretooth asked.

She simply nodded at this and added: "Part of our escape plan..."

Suddenly the fire of a gun was heard, very close to them. Nearly simultaneously the blonde mutant roared in pain and his right shoulder started bleeding. He had to drop the tube and Deadpool´s irritating voice yelled from behind: "Sorry, Simba. But I need it!" The man covered in red and black spandex rushed towards them, hunted by several Thorns. He leaped on the tube and pushed it with himself sitting on it forward. Sliding towards the next window, Deadpool wanted to make sure it broke and threw two grenades at it. The explosions shattered the glass, making room for the lunatic sitting on the glass and metal container, still with the purple 'it' inside. During the fall he pulled of his mask with his right hand and made a fast waving motion, singing:

" _We´ll meet again, don´t know where, don´t know when,..._ "

Furious Sabretooth snarled: "Oh, yeah, I hope so, because I gonna kill ya for that!"

The Thorns opened fire at the three remaining intruders, which rushed to the next staircase.

As they looked down X-23 said: "They´ll get us, if we walk."

"I know!", Widow said and leaped down. She used her acrobatic skills to climb her way down in fast motions, using the handrails of the stairs. X-23 did it like the more experienced woman, but was not less agile and skilled like her.

Sabretooth closed the door behind them with a metal bar he bent around the door knob. As he saw both women doing their thing he simply grunted: "You make this look so easy..."

Unexpectedly two other Thorns came from below. They aimed with their guns at both acrobats and started to fire. Natasha and Laura took cover by pressing themselves against the walls. Both armed men leaned over the handrails to get a better aim at their targets. But this decision proved to be fatal for them. As their heads peeked out, a mighty roar that rivaled this of a lion howled through the staircase. Both looked up and saw the deadly figure of Sabretooth jumping down on them. With both clawed paws extended he rushed between the handrails, ripping their faces off as they met his natural weapons. Before he fell to the bottom of the staircase he reached out for a handrail, which bent itself under his weight.

As he tried to get a grip, both females passed him, again using their athletic skills to be faster.

"Out of breath, Creed?", X-23 chuckled as she reached the floor below him.

"Shut up, Kinney.", he snarled, dropping himself to the same floor.

Widow was the first of them reaching the bottom floor and ran to the next door. "Hurry up. Skye and Overdrive are waiting. And let´s hope Wade didn´t destroy whatever we tried to 'save'!"

###

He heard a voice from the distance, calling his name. His hearing was numbed, his vision blurry. But in a matter of seconds it normalized and he saw what was going on.

"Wade, you insane jerk! Move your scattered ass over here!", Skye yelled. She was standing in the opened back of the tank, Deadpool saw before. Behind her was Overdrive sitting at the controls, having some kind of dark aura around his hands. The rail guns blasted some Thorns trying to attack into oblivion and Skye´s hands emitted some sort of seismic waves that twirled the men and women around like they were puppets. These Inhuman-powers gave her her first codename, Quake.

As Deadpool, who found himself on the concrete looked around he could eye the tube he sat on. The glass wasn´t broken, but it had some cracks on it. "That was a ride. But I doubt many caught the movie-reference...", he murmured. "The lava lamp is still fine..."

His lower body was a bloody mess. "You belong here...your place is here...I will find something for you...", he said as he was putting his own pieces of flesh and bones back together.

Skye rushed over to the mashed man and the contained purple being. In a angered voice she commanded: "Get your shit together, Wade! We have to leave!"

"Was that pun intended? And what is that thing I was taking a ride with? Hopefully not a A-bomb, this would have made the reference more authentic than planned!", the merc remarked in a annoying voice.

"You _plan_ something stupid out before you do it?", Skye stated in shock.

"Sometimes. But most things come spontaneously...", he said with a shrug.

The Inhuman just shook her head and shot another seismic wave at some Thorns. "And 'No', this is not an A-bomb, which doesn´t make your action less stupid and dangerous. We don´t know what it is, only that it seems to be alive and has a lot, and I mean a _lot_ of power." Seismic attacks and some more bullets filled the air, while the former agent and the mercenary tried to get the purple glowing being into the tank. From the inside of the tube it watched everything that was happening around like it has never been on the outside before.

"Eh, I don´t like being that guy but...it would be nice if you could hurry up a little. This war-like scenery kinda freaks me out...", Overdrive´s voice came from the tank in a unsure tone.

"We´re coming, Evel Knievel. But carrying a huge living battery is not as easy as it might look like!", the merc exclaimed.

Suddenly Wade and Skye got the tube ripped out of their hands. Luckily it was just Sabretooth, who took it. "Sorry, Daisy. But YOU, Wade...", his index finger was touching Deadpool´s chest with some pressure. "We´ll have a serious talk when we´re back home!"

Behind him was Black Widow shooting at their attackers with her gauntlets while X-23 sliced her way through the men and women with two adamantium claws per hand and one per foot.

In spinning wheel motions she cut the Thorns into pieces and reached the tank.

"What´s this?", she asked when everyone was inside.

"It´s a one of a kind tank, created by me!", Overdrive´s somewhat shy voice said proud.

"My mutation allows me to pimp a ride. Any vehicle I touch becomes whatever I want it to be, as long as my hands have still contact with it in some way."

Sabretooth and Skye positioned the tube safely in the back of the tank, while the rest of the team placed themselves on the seats. The short haired woman said: "Gotta say, ´Drive: you impressed me. Now I´m feeling bad for what I said to you in the hangar."

"Forgotten and forgiven, Ms. Johnson.", he answered. "Take your seats and hold on tight!"

Black Widow turned around and peeked at the purple being in the tube. In a calm but strong voice she told her team: "We´re going home. Hope there will be no trouble on our way."

###

With this I´ll end the second chapter.

I really hope you liked it and will read on. Constructive reviews are welcome.

As you can see, the main idea behind this story is basically the same as it was in

"Old Man Logan", but I expanded it to a global level.

Other sources of inspiration I took are mainly the classic Star Wars-trilogy

(more in a subtle way- so don´t expect lightsabers or the force), the Mad Max movies,

Escape from NY and many more.

Here some trivia:

The black scroll that Speed Demon mentions exists inside the 616 Marvel Universe.

Kingpin really used it to gain the services of Ghost Rider during the Daredevil-story 'Shadowland'.

I took my own liberty with the splitting of Zarathos on several individuals at once, but I think

it´s not that far fetched, considering that we had more than just one Ghost Rider at once.

The Thorns are mainly inspired by the Ghost Riders from the 'Old Man Logan' story and somewhat

by the War-Boys from 'Mad Max: Fury Road'.

Why did I name Kingpin´s henchmen 'Thorns'?

Kingpin always had a rose as his trademark and even his son Richard had the masked identity called

'Rose'. Roses have thorns, that protect them somewhat from harm, so that made it kinda obvious for me to call them like that.

Deadpool´s ride on the tube homages the classic Stanley Kubrick flick

'Dr. Strangelove or: How I learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb' (1964)

Until next time!


	3. Chapter 3

Welcome back to my 'New World Order' in the Marvel Universe.

Let´s go!

 **Chapter 3: What a lovely day**

Washington DC. The capital of the former United States of America. Once it was a proud and magnificent city. But since the heroes vanished it lost all what made it once worth living here or visiting it. The White House was once known as the home of the President. But there hasn´t been any President for five years now. Since the villains took over, the house was the home of Wilson and Vanessa Fisk, the self-declared Royal Family of the newly founded Kingdom of America.

Most of the time the city was quiet under the rule of the Fisks. But today was an expectation. The Triskelion reported intruders. Intruders that were escaping with a colossal tank, that could be easily identified by it´s pitch-black and dark green colors and it´s heavy weaponry made up of a giant rail gun and two Gatling guns. It made it´s way through the city, heading for the highway and leaving a path of crushed cars and destroyed signs and street lamps behind. On it´s tail were masses of people, riding on motorcycles or driving with cars, that looked like they had some accidents in the past. It also seemed like these vehicles would be on fire, and their drivers had all bright orange glowing skins, some also had burnt holes in their cheeks or elsewhere. Their eyes were also emitting in flames and their breath looked like smoke. Running forward with his uncanny, super-human speed was the super-villain James Sanders. Once known as the Whizzer, now calling himself Speed Demon. A name that was fitting his new appearance. He looked like a costumed skull on flames. During his run he left a streak of fire behind, making it easy for the Thorns to follow him on the hunt for the escaping enemies.

"It seems that we can´t shake them.", Widow said bluntly.

"I´m sorry, but I´m doing my very best, Ms. Romanov. But this thing is already at full speed.", Overdrive explained shaken.

Natasha stood up and went to the back before she reassured him: "Don´t worry, ´Drive. You did great so far." She looked at her team and commanded: "Okay, everybody. Victor and Laura, you will have some fun with the guns. I´ll will use the rail gun and Skye and Deadpool will have to do the most dangerous part: Overdrive will open the loading space and you´ll fire everything you got at our persecutors."

"I will what?", the helmet wearing man at the controls cried out shocked.

"Open the loading space.", Widow repeated and gained a nervous glare after which she added playful: "Come on, it´ll be fun."

"I bet the following scene would go _great_ with 'Brothers in Arms' by Junkie XL. Even the title of this chapter is a 'Mad Max' quote.", Deadpool stated.

Meanwhile both mutants of the group started to heat up their weapons and mowed down many Thorns in their reach.

"Think you are ready for this, Kinney?", Sabretooth said somewhat mocking her.

She had a small grin on her side as she snarled: "I was created for this. I bet I get more than you."

"Deal!"

Widow, now at the rail gun shot down another car of the Thorns and added: "This is the reason I didn´t wanted Victor and Wade at the guns, because I thought it would end in a comparison contest. But I think I made it worse."

Down below everyone heard the banter and Deadpool remarked: "Don´t worry, red. There´s nothing that could be compared with my _Love Gun_!"

"Urgh, disgusting...", Skye muffed, hitting two bikers with her seismic waves.

Two other bikers suddenly came from both sides and started to shoot at the mercenary and the Inhuman. The latter dodged the bullets while Wade took three into his left arm and another one into his triangle. A high-pitched shriek filled the air as the red and black covered man collapsed into himself on the floor of the tank.

"This gun wasn´t lovely at all..", Skye remarked as she leashed out against their pursuers.

Deadpool´s breath slowly returned as his mad voice slowly built up to it´s aggressive climax:

"This. _Means_. WAR!" In blind rage he shot several bullets into the masses, reloading as quick as he pulled the trigger of the pistols. "Never shoot a man into his juice crew! NEVER!"

One of the cars, a black one whose engines were visible on the outside, came dangerously close to the tank. On it sat a female Thorn, like she was ready to leap on it. In her hand she held some kind of bag, which was filled with something. Out if this bag came a fuse which she gladly lit on fire. Skye aimed for the car before the explosive could be thrown, but suddenly she was taken off her feet. Two burning hands pressed her down and she looked directly into the flaming skeleton visage of the former Whizzer, who let out a scream that crawled under the skin of everyone present.

"Oh, shiiieeet. Ms. Romanov! A monster is here with us!", Overdrive panicked

Deadpool did not forget about the incoming bomb construction, which was thrown by the female Thorn accompanied by her maniacal laughter. When the bag with a burning fuse was mid-air the merc aimed for it and pulled the trigger. To his unpleasant surprise he had no more bullets left.

"Author! We need a serious talk when this story is finished! It´s not fair getting me from one unlucky situation into the nex-" His rant was interrupted when the explosive landed to his feet.

"Exactly what I mean!", he pointed angered at it as it exploded and ripped a giant hole into the right side of the tank. The detonation ripped Laura out of her seat and destroyed the Gatling gun she used the whole time against distanced Thorns. Her legs caught some pieces of metal, which were digging very deep down into her flesh. Between the torn pieces of the jeans up to her knees were her burnt and partly vaporized skin and muscles visible. She scoffed and shrugged off the pain as good as possible, simply because she knew that everything would grow back and she was used to injuries like that.

Skye was lucky in two different aspects: First, only her left gauntlet was damaged by pieces of metal, when she protected herself from the explosion and second was that Speed Demon´s flaming skeleton body protected her unintentionally as he prepared himself to finish her off and he got blown into pieces. His head landed besides Overdrive, who was still processing what was happening around him. The man in the biker-outfit yelled: "What the literal hell is going on? This is insane!"

"Laura, are you okay?", Natasha asked, still firing with the rail gun at pursuing cars.

"I´m fine. It will grow back.", she grunted. Sabretooth chuckled at this and blasted another vehicle with it´s passengers into oblivion.

"Skye. Overdrive. What about you?", the red-haired ex-spy wanted to know.

"I lost one of my gauntlets, so my seismic waves won´t be that precise anymore. But otherwise

we´re fine."

"We´re fine? A demonic flaming skull landed in front of me! We have a huge hole in the side of our tank! And don´t forget the others that are after us!", Overdrive´s voice struggled in a panic.

"Focus on your driving. We´ll be running with the devils...", Skye said.

"Was that a Van Halen reference?", a snarly voice yelled from the side of the tank.

"Wade?", X-23 asked. She climbed out of the remaining pieces of her seat and looked through the hole. On the side of the tank was Deadpool dangling with his right arm impaled by some shrapnel that stood up from the metal. His mask was vaporized, like some parts of his costume in general.

"If nobody asks after me I have to gain the attention for myself. Okay, Wolverina, would you please help me to get inside? I hate being side-lined in such a action scene, simply because I was created for shit like that!"

"If you stop that nonsensical talk, I will consider it.", she said annoyed.

Another Thorn on a motorcycle came closer to her and prepared a strike with a flaming chain. But before he lashed out, Deadpool used his free hand to aim with his gun at him. As he pulled the trigger he remembered that he ran out of ammunition several moments ago.

"Seriously, we need a talk...", he muttered and threw his weapon into the front wheel which made the vehicle collapse and it´s driver slamming onto the ground. "I´m supposed to be much more awesome than this! Stop making me look bad."

X-23 climbed on the side, burying her claws into the metal. She ignored the scratches she got from the other upstanding splinters she had to press her body against. "Take my hand, Wade!", she yelled.

But without any warning a shot hit the young woman into the back. Another black car drove closer to them, with three passengers. A male one, who aimed with a smoking shot gun at them. A female one that seemingly prepared another explosive bag and a second female driving.

"Hey, Widow! Victor! Are you hitting _anything_ with your weapons?", Deadpool stated.

"Shut up, Wade!", Creed sneered.

"What Victor is trying to say is that we´re a bit overwhelmed here!", Natasha said.

Both shot down so many vehicles as possible, but they also had to fight with the overheating effect of their powerful guns.

X-23 felt another shot in her back by the man on the car passing Overdrive´s tank. Instead letting out a scream of pain, she burst out a roar of fury! She dug her adamantium claws deeper into the metal in front of her. She pressed herself closer to it, balancing all her weight on her feet. With full force she pushed herself away from the tank and landed on the car. With the claw of her right foot she cut off the fingers of her attacker in a roundhouse kick motion. Before he registered his loss, her left foot claw did the same with his whole head. The Thorn preparing the improvised bomb put out a butterfly knife and tried to use it against Laura, who shrugged at the sight of it and stated that it was "Cute."

Before both clashed, Deadpool landed on the car, only one arm left. The other one was still dangling

at the shrapnel that impaled it. "Sorry, I lost my girlfriend over there. Could you help me out?", he quipped towards the female Thorn at the steering wheel. "You wish, ugly!", she said and pulled out a gun. Before she could pull the trigger, Deadpool reached with his left arm for the wheel and pulled it towards the tank. The woman with the butterfly knife lost her balance and fell off the car. X-23 jumped back on the tank, while Deadpool was slammed against it´s side and the car exploded as it came under the spiked chains of Overdrive´s machine. Now Deadpool´s torso was impaled at the same shrapnel his arm was still hanging on. He looked down at it and commented: "This is getting out of hand..."

On the other side Sabretooth had to leave his seat too because his weapon overheated and malfunctioned.

"He, Overdrive! I thought everything would be great as long as you have control over it!", he grunted somewhat accusing. Skye calmed him down and explained: "Listen, Victor. His powers are getting overused now. At the moment it´s impossible to talk to him. He told me that he has to focus more and more the longer he manipulates the tank and we´re getting attacked."

A bit less angered Victor looked to the other ex-villain and could see by the way he sat there that he was really struggling to keep what is left together. "Than I have to think of something."

With his cat-like abilities he climbed outside, on the top of the tank.

Black Widow, still firing with the rail gun eyed him and asked: "Victor? Why are you not inside?"

Sabretooth crawled towards his Gatling gun. He took a stabilized stance behind it and answered:

"Needed some air!" His paws grabbed the gun and with all his power he tried to lift it. Ripping it successfully from it´s moorings he lifted the heavy weapon over his head. With a mighty roar he threw it at a car coming closer to him. The heavy impact on it´s hood made it flip and land on it´s roof. Spinning around in a circle motion it hit three motorcycles and let their drivers meet the asphalt street in a uncomfortable way.

"That...that was kinda...wow!", Natasha tried hard not to sound too much impressed.

"Victor!", Skye yelled. "That was awesome!"

X-23, who just got back into the interior of their vehicle didn´t bother and asked: "Is the tube okay?"

Skye took a look at the object in question and remarked: "It got a few scratches, probably because of the explosion. We better hurry up, if we want to reach our extraction point in one piece. Natasha, how far is it still away?"

"Far enough to get still torn apart! I think we´ll have still a way that´ll take fifteen minutes!", the Russian red-head answered.

"Shit.", was the Inhuman´s reaction.

"How are we supposed to know what our extraction point looks like? I´m hanging here and see nothing expect some trees and a loooooong way down. This bridge is high as hell! And not in a stoned way!", Deadpool commented, still his torso impaled.

"We´re on a bridge?", Skye asked.

"Yup. Like I said.", the merc answered.

Skye thought a moment as her teammates were still holding back the Thorns. Then she had an idea:

"I have to use my powers in a big, a really big way! But it could become dangerous for us too. There is a fifty-fifty chance that it will kill us all."

"Than do it. Won´t be _that_ bad.", Widow said sarcastic.

"Don´t worry, Daisy.", Sabretooth snarled smiling. "If we die we will blame Wade because he gave you the idea."

"Just because I was reduced to a stooge does this not mean I´m responsible for casualties!", Deadpool exclaimed.

Skye positioned herself and saw the masses of Thorns that were still hunting them. She told X-23 to fixate the tube and protect it from any damage. Her arms were now fully extended. All her focus was now on her powers. She never used them in that capacity, especially not with only one gauntlet that helped her to channel her seismic attacks.

She felt that the ground began to shake very slowly. But it became faster and harder exponentially.

After a few moments the first cracks were on the asphalt. And another few moments later the bridge started to collapse. Rustling pieces of street, accompanied by falling cars and motorcycles and the sounds of screaming Thorns, meeting their doom in the abyss beneath them were heard.

A extremely exhausted Skye collapsed, but was caught by a into the interior returning Sabretooth before she hit the floor.

"I don´t know if I´m the only one seeing this, but I think we got the bad fifty percent of the plan!", Natasha said surprisingly calm, considering that the street they were driving on was collapsing behind them and they would probably follow the same fate as their persecutors.

"Mysterious plot-device man at twelve o´clock!", Deadpool yelled.

A few yards away was a young, dark-skinned man standing on the bridge. He wore a big cape with a hood, that was covered in dark blue and pitch-black stripes. He opened his cape as they drove closer towards him. Now the mysterious figure was surrounded by black energy that could be easily described as dark force.

Overdrive, still not talking and at the edge of his power, didn´t slow down. He drove right into the dark force and the whole tank vanished.

Suddenly Black Widow´s team found itself in a long hangar, that looked like it was some part a underground facility. Totally exhausted Overdrive stopped the tank and let go of it.

"I...I´m tired...", he sighed, letting go of the controls and reverting the machine back to it´s normal state. Black Widow said somewhat caring: "You were great, ´Drive. Without you we would have been dead. You deserve your rest. We all do..."

She walked out of the tank, followed by Sabretooth who carried Skye and X-23 who supported a weaken Overdrive. Outside of this deadly machine they looked after Deadpool, who remarked:

"All of you get a cool 'We made it!' march and _I_ have to-"

"Wade, shut up for once...", Natasha interrupted annoyed.

All six individuals were still getting out of their immense adrenaline rush as a male voice said:

"Damn, guys..."

As they looked up they eyed the hooded man that brought them here. To his left was a young woman in his age, dressed in a white spandex suit that had a cleavage cut out like a cross, which went down to her belly button. Around her eye was a white circled tattoo.

To the right of the Afro-American man was another man of the same ethnicity, but much taller with much more muscles and dressed in a dark yellow muscle shirt and blue jeans.

A raven-black haired woman was also part of the group, covered in a skintight red spandex suit with a yellow triangle-like symbol on her belly. The only part of her face that wasn´t visible was covered with a red mask and two white eye-lenses.

The man that spoke and lead them wore a well known red and blue, skintight spandex suit, covering his whole body. He also had bigger versions of the white eye-lenses on his mask and a small spider on his chest. On his back he carried a round shield, that was colored in red and blue and had a silver star in it´s middle. He continued his sentence: "I didn´t knew that Wade would be such an ugly hood ornament!"

"Please, Peter...I´m happy to see you and that you send Cloak wider than planned...but we´re all not in the mood for your quips now...", Black Widow answered pleading.

"Okay, I´ll pull myself together.", Spider-Man said with waving hands. After that he added with a warm and honest voice: "Welcome home, guys. Glad you survived it..."

###

When villains took over the world, the people just got two choices: Either to follow their leadership like a silenced lamb at the cost of their free will or being free for only mere moments before getting slaughtered. Most of the people chose the first, just to save themselves. Now they were living under the dictatorship of gruesome men and women, not hesitating to kill if they just want to have fun.

Many people are hoping for better times to come, for the return of the heroes. Others already gave up every spark of hope and just accepted that they have reached a new dark age.

One of the latter ones was Robert Baldwin. The man with a slender but muscular physique and somewhat longer blonde hair was once known as a super-hero himself. Back then, the day the villains attacked, he survived and vanished. Now residing in in a small town in Arizona, he created a new life for himself, married a beautiful woman and since ten months they had a little son.

They built this life away from all this costumed craze, focusing on living like normal people and not getting into the way of any of the evil individuals that are now in charge. So far it really worked out well, but everything good finds it´s end.

He found himself on his knees, only a few yards away from the edge of the Grand Canyon. His hands were tied together with a heavy chain, which had a wrecking ball at it´s end. In front of him was his wife, holding their baby, shaking in fear. A reddish-blonde woman who had a muscular shape that rivaled this of many Olympic weightlifters had a tight grip on his wife´s arm. The muscular female wore a purple domino-mask and a fitting long-sleeved top and short pants. Her knee-long boots had the same color and like the sleeves small spikes on it.

She was accompanied by the man who tied Robert, a even more muscular man with a bald head and only wearing a white tank top and purple striped jeans. He recognized both as the villainous married couple Titania and the Absorbing Man, a duo that even gave the Hulk and other powerhouses in the hero-community a hard time.

A bit in the back and closer to the edge of the cliff was a man dressed in military combat clothes. On his back was a gun and at his belt hang a knife. His Kevlar vest had two bones painted on it in a way too look like a 'X'. The face of the man was hidden behind a skull mask. His was known as Crossbones, a man who had many confrontations with Captain America in his life.

On the left of Robert was the Radioactive Man in his yellow containment suit.

"Baldwin, Baldwin...next time you better don´t get in my way. I don´t like it when somebody interrupts me in a fist fight!.", Creel the Absorbing Man snarled. "If you haven´t tried to be a good Samaritan down in this bar, we would probably never found you and your family.", Titania added.

"Mostly because we don´t waste time on searching pathetic third string heroes like you.", Creel grunted.

Chen Lu shot small blasts of concentrated radiation into the former hero, who just groaned in pain. His wife screamed out his name and their baby was crying. Lu added: "What a ridiculous name was 'Speedball' anyway? Sounds some sort of game kids play on the street." Another blast hit him.

Creel looked closely at their victim and remarked: "Though little guy are we, huh?"

"Hit him with your powers, Carl.", the mighty villainess said to her husband.

Carl Creel´s hand touched the ground beneath him. The hand suddenly changed it´s complete molecular basis. It gained the same attributes as the deserted mineral ground they all were standing on.

With his now rocky fist he punched Robbie Baldwin several times into his face. Blood and teeth were spread over the ground, always accompanied by pleading cries of Titania´s hostage.

"I think it´s enough, Creel.", another female voice ordered. The former Speedball couldn´t see the person who was talking because she was behind him. But he heard her steps slowly walking towards him. As she reached him, she leaned down to him and looked him into the eyes:

"Remember me, Robbie?", she said with a cunning smile and sadism in her voice.

"Karla...", he snarled muffed but angry.

"Still a tough boy, like back in our days as Thunderbolts.", she remarked. "You´ve changed a lot, Robbie. At first a stupid boy in a even more stupid costume, thinking his powers could help the world. Then, after he caused accidentally the deaths of hundreds of innocents he became a masochist...and now a fully grown man, who just wants to live a family life..."

She walked towards Robbie´s wife and pressed her cheeks together, commenting: "She´s cute."

Now she took the baby away from the crying woman and caressed it, still with a malicious smile towards the former Speedball. The blonde villainess said: "And a beautiful little boy you have.."

Pressured by this whole situation, Baldwin asked through the blood still running out of his mouth:

"What do you want from me, Karla? If you want me to stay out of your business...okay, I´ll never be in your way, ever again." This made the sadistic woman laugh and the other villains, expect Crossbones, chuckled at this too.

"Out of our way? No, no, Robbie. We have other plans. See: Coincidentally we lost today one of us, I don´t know if you ever heard of him just because you had similar names, and we need a replacement. Not that we would stop still recruiting others, anyway. But 'Speedball' for 'Speed Demon' sounds _especially_ good in my mind, am I right?" She looked at her fellow criminals who agreed nodding.

"I won´t work for the Kingpin...", Robbie snarled.

"I know you would say that.", Moonstone said and gave Crossbones a sign. The masked man walked towards her and took the baby she was still holding. With the child on his arm he slowly moved towards the cliff.

"No, Karla...tell him to stop, I beg you!", Robbie exclaimed afraid.

Crossbones was now at the edge of the cliff and reached out the hand he was holding the child in, ready to let it drop into the depths of the Grand Canyon.

"If you want your family to live on, you better accept our deal, okay?", Karla Sofen said joyful.

Her index finger was now at Baldwin´s chin as she lifted it in a gentle movement.

He asked: "What´s this pact with the devil?"

"Nice of you to call it like that..." Moonstone placed her finger now on her lips. "Because it´s literally that. We´ll explain it to you on the way to the Fisks. Don´t worry, your wife and child will be set free." She gave Crossbones another sign. Now the masked man pulled his arm slowly back and held the baby in a caring motion. Titania also relaxed her grip on the helpless woman.

Absorbing Man freed the former Speedball from his chain and pointed towards the Radioactive Man, who was sitting on some kind of motorcycle without any wheels. Instead it looked like it had two big repulsors at their places, which made it possible to fly with it.

"Jump on.", Chen Lu said and Robbie did as he was told. He glared over to his wife and looked her into the eyes, reassuring: "I´ll save you, sweetie."

Now both men took off with the flying vehicle and made their way into the night. When they were far away Moonstone took off with her flying powers, too. But before she completely left, she nodded towards the remaining individuals.

Crossbones now threw the child like a piece of trash into the Grand Canyon. Before the mother of the boy could scream out, her neck got broken in a fast, one-handed motion by Titania. Her body dropped motionless into the sand and the three villains left.

Creel, who carried the wrecking ball remarked to his mighty wife: "What a lovely day, isn´t it?"

###

In the north of San Francisco, across the world famous Golden Gate Bridge, are the Marin Headlands. Once located there were Graymalkin Industries, undercover headquarters that have been used in the past by the super-hero group known as the X-Men. Long-abandoned military bunkers were now used by some families and other survivors who could escape the villains and are living hidden from them for five years now on this base. Helpful was that it had many underground bunkers, too. So, if there would be ever some kind of danger for the base, they could still try to hide themselves down below.

The leadership and security of the base was in the hands of the remaining heroes of this world, made up of Spider-Man, his counterpart Spider-Woman, the Black Widow, Luke Cage and few others.

Down in the hangar was still the tank Widow´s team used to escape the Thorns. At least what was still left of it. Around it was a small group of heroes, examining it.

Spider-Man, Black Widow and Luke Cage had company from the Vision, who had lost his old android body on the last day of heroism. Only his functioning head and parts of his upper body and cape were left, which Spider-Man supplied with new diverse robotic parts. Vision´s left lower arm was now replaced with the leftovers of a electric jackhammer. But in the place of it´s concrete-smashing tip was now a hand, similar to a claw inside of a toy vending machine, but much more solid. His complete right arm was now made of parts of a silver-black armor Spidey once used against a villainous group called the New Enforcers, long before he even was an Avenger. It´s interior was made up of several circuits and electronics, that made it possible for Vision to move it like any of his previous arms. His legs were now former parts of some Iron Man armors by Tony Stark. Spider-Man collected these pieces shortly after all this happened and made it possible for the android to walk again.

Another former Avenger wasn´t that lucky, but still alive. Colonel James Rhodes was once known as War Machine. But now he was forced to move around in a hovering chair, which was once used by Professor Charles Xavier, mentor of the mutant team who once lived in here, too.

Cage carried out the purple glowing tube and placed it in front of the whole group.

Rhodey simply asked: "Okay, Natasha. What is that?"

"We have no idea. We only know that _it_ is somewhat alive. Kinda...", she answered. The light-being that illuminated the tube looked from one hero to another, curious like a little child.

"I thought it could possibly be an A.I.!", Natasha added.

Spider-Man, now without his mask and revealing his hazel-brown hair and now fully grown beard, went over to the glass and metal container and put his hand on one of the cracks. The being inside did the same, so that it´s hand was now parallel to Peter´s. "It doesn´t look like a machine. More like pure energy. Maybe some kind of compromised radiation with it´s own awareness."

Vision scanned and analyzed what was in front of them and said in a polite manner: "It is nothing like me. Our guest may be one of multiple akin extraterrestrial lifeforms."

"Multiple? You´re saying that this is from outer space and not alone?", Cage asked with his arms crossed.

"Indeed. Like Mr. Parker already established, is this entity emitting some kind of non harmful cosmic radiation, similar to these that my scanners knew from the race of the Kree. But this is different...", the android said with an doubtful impression.

Peter now crossed his arms too as Cage and Natasha asked in unison:"What´s different?"

"It feels...incomplete.", Vision said confused.

"Incomplete? Like: it´s still searching it´s soul-mate or what?", the shield-carrying web-head asked.

"No, but similar and more like a phantom pain, like it´s missing a essential part of it´s body..."

Natasha rubbed her eye-patch and Rhodey did the same with his paralyzed legs and murmured:

"We know that feel..."

Vision looked down at himself and continued: "But not only in physical means, also in soul and mind. It is searching for his own components, comparable to a puzzle that tries to put itself together."

Peter glared again into the tube and his eyes met those of the being in it. Something was familiar about this sight, but he wasn´t sure what it was. "Okay, we´ll bring it into my lab. It´s safe in there and none of our people should know about its existence, yet. I don´t want that they worry about an unknown living thing in our base."

Rhodey answered: "Let me take care of it´s transport. Rover!"

His yell was heard through the whole hangar. Suddenly the ground began shaking and a mighty figure came out of the shadows. A nearly twenty feet tall humanoid robot with dark blue and purple paint was now visible. In a mechanical voice it asked curious: " _Destroy?_ "

Now Vision spoke to the metallic behemoth: "Rover, would you kindly bring our guest.." He gestured towards the purple being which looked curious at the giant robot. "To Mr. Parker´s laboratory? It is a urgent matter."

The behemoth called Rover confirmed: " _Destroy!_ "

It´s colossal hand grabbed the tube in a, as far as it was possible for him gentle matter and carried it away. Vision and Rhodey followed it and the latter added: "Please be careful, Rover! We don´t want another disaster like that with the fuel barrels that suddenly stood in flames!"

Sad Rover said: "... _destroy..._ "

"No, Colonel Rhodes is not infuriated by this, my big immature friend. He just wants to avoid accidents like this to happen again."

A much happier sounding " _Destroy!_ " followed this statement of Vision.

Peter, Natasha and Luke, who were still standing besides the damaged tank glared after this strange little group and the Afro-American remarked: "I´m still not comfortable with a Sentinel as a pet..."

"Right now, when I wanted to say 'Aren´t they cute?' you ruined the mood. Great work, Luke!", Spider-Man quipped.

Natasha walked off and stated that she needed a shower. Luke and Peter now wanted to leave the hangar too. But The shield-wearing man eyed his female counterpart sitting on some stairs and staring into the distance.

"Don´t wait for me, Luke. There is-"

"Waiting was not my intention.", Luke said stiff but still in a non-serious mocking tone.

Jessica Drew alias Spider-Woman was looking somewhere into nowhere. She was so lost in her thoughts that she even didn´t realize how her male counterpart walked up from behind.

"A penny!"

"Wh—what?", she asked shocked, turning her head towards him. "What penny, Pete?"

Both spider-themed heroes were now sitting next to each other, still in costume but with their masks off their faces.

"A penny for your thoughts. That´s what my aunt always said when I was moody and brooding because of my spider-life.", he said. "I think it comes from our arachnid DNA. Are real spiders also that broody?", he quipped, gaining a small smile from her.

"What´s the matter, Jess? You know you can talk to me about everything."

She rested her head on her bent knees and muffed: "I know, Pete. And I´m more than grateful for this...but right now I´d prefer to keep it to myself, if it´s okay for you."

His hand rested on her shoulder and he answered: "Of course it is. I just let you know, if you´re ready to talk you can count on _this_ guy here." His thumbs were pointing towards himself.

Jessica chuckled at this and asked: "What was that thing that Nat and the others brought in?"

"Don´t know. Vision´s scan said it was partly Kree, but incomplete as a sole lifeform. There have to be others out there."

Both now looked into the direction in that Vision, Rhodey and Rover were bringing the entity in the tube to.

The male spider-hero continued: "I´ll work on some tests and experiments to find out what it is and how we can help it. It looked so helpless, but still powerful. I don´t think it´ll harm us."

"What makes you so sure?"

"The way it looked at me. Something about it was...strangely familiar, _trustworthy_...I can´t explain it." He grabbed the shield on his back and stared at it: "But if I´m wrong, everyone around here is in grave danger. I´m putting the life of everyone on the line just because of my instincts. Sometimes I doubt Steve´s decision..."

"Don´t be like that!", Jessica now said in a reminding tone.

"Do what?"

"Doing what you do right now! Drowning in self-doubt as our leader! Steve chose you for a special reason, Peter! He always knew what you were, are and will be capable of. He always had the opinion that you will become the greatest of us all. Even Logan, who never admitted it in your presence said that you will become the greatest of us all!"

Logan alias Wolverine was a long-time companion of Peter. Both fought several battles side-by-side and could always count on each other. The hairy, clawed mutant was not easy to have around, but still a respected member of the hero-community. Peter and him had always honored each other and would even call each other a friend.

Jessica continued: "When Steve died and gave you his shield, he knew that you would be the one who could gather us, heroes and civilians and even some villains with a change of heart, and bring us into safety. He knew, that your brain and your heart, _your instincts_ would be the only way to keep us all together and survive this mess, that ruins lives since five years now! So, Peter: If you ever, _ever_ doubt your role as our leader again, I will personally zap your face with my bio-energy bolts until you look like Wade!"

Peter gulped at her honest words, because he knew she would make her promise come true regarding his face. "Wow, Jess, I...I´m speechless!"

"Never thought this was possible.", she chuckled.

"Me neither. Scary thought that you would let me look like that psycho.", he quipped with a smile.

Both let out a small laughter and were silent for a moment. After a while he stood up and said:

"I should look at our guest. This will be another night in the lab."

"From time to time, you should consider some sleep, Pete.", the British woman said worried.

"Nah, sleep is overrated. Coffee is the real deal.", he joked again before he said on a more serious note: "And Jess, if I can do anything for you, don´t hesitate to ask."

She looked at him with a warm smile and said: "There would be actually _one_ tiny thing you could do..."

"Like I just said, I have no time for sleep-"

"Not that. But..." Her hand now tickled his beard. "You should shave. You look like the worst kind of hipster!"

###

"Are you really ready for this, Mr. Baldwin?", Wilson Fisk, wearing haori and hakama, traditional Japanese clothes, asked.

"Yes, I am."

"You are aware of the pain and that every single use of your new powers will cost you splinters of your soul.", Vanessa Fisk, wearing uchikake asked.

"For my family, this is a price I´m willing to take!"

"Well,", Mr. Fisk said. "Let´s begin the rite."

The black-haired wife of the bald Kingpin opened a ancient scroll. Robbie Baldwin sat in the middle of a pentagram, that was painted on the floor. Around it were also candles standing in a circle, that were illuminating the dark room in a weak light.

Vanessa started to read unidentifiable words while her husband had a pleased smile on his big face.

Robbie suddenly felt heat rising in his body. In a matter of seconds it felt like his veins were burning to ashes and his flesh would vaporize by the heat.

After a while Robbie became a skeleton in flames. His bones were also covered in small spikes, his corner teeth sharpen like that of a predator.

He let out a deep, bloodcurdling roar that blew out all candles and shattered the only window in the room.

Both Fisks stood up and slowly walked towards the now as well by Zarathos possessed Baldwin.

"Mr. Baldwin, I have to say, none of our Thorns had such an effective transformation into a

Spirit of Vengeance. The spikes seem a bit too much, but not too shabby...not too shabby at all.",

the kimono-wearing man remarked in his typical calculating manner.

"I must say, it´s a extraordinary sight. And I´m sure you will exceed our expectations,

Mr. Baldwin.", Mrs. Fisk added.

"When can I see my family?", the demonic former Speedball asked.

Kingpin tried not to smile at this question, remembering what Moonstone and the others did to the now-demon´s wife and child. At first he did not approve of this action, because he once lost his own son Richard, but somehow he was now able to enjoy the cruel irony of this.

"You´ll see them, when your work is done. Which will be when we tell you, you´re done.", he answered.

Baldwin hang his head down until Vanessa said: "The first you´ll do: some enemies of my husband and me have stolen something that belongs to us. Find them, kill them and bring it back."

"How do I find them?", he asked them confused.

"Listen to your inner voice...", Kingpin added.

Shaking his head, Robert wanted to leave the room. But Mr. Fisk stopped him at first: "Before you leave, Mr. Baldwin. Should we still call you 'Mr. Baldwin' like now or 'Ghost Rider'."

"Neither, I´m using one of my old names.", he answered.

Confused Wilson asked again: "You really want to use 'Speedball' again?"

"No...", Robbie said. "Call me Penance!"

###

As always constructive reviews are welcome.

The next chapter will be probably less action-focused and more about the remaining heroes

that are living in the secret base now.

This means there are definitely coming more character-moments than before in this story.

Trivia:

The idea of Spidey using Cap´s shield came not from the short scene in the Civil War-movie.

The inspiration behind it was a cosplay I once saw which made Spidey´s suit look like Cap´s uniform, but sadly I don´t remember by whom.

Rover was a real character in the cartoon "Wolverine & the X-Men".

He only appeared in one episode of this great (and far too soon canceled) show, but his little 'destroy' made me love this Sentinel on an instant.

Robbie Baldwin was mostly known as Speedball since his debut in the late 1980s.

But since the comic book-version of the Civil War he wore an armor and called himself

Penance and joined Norman Osborn´s Thunderbolts.

Graymalkin Industries was really an undercover hideout used by the X-Men after

their mansion got destroyed during 'The Messiah Complex'.

Well, this was it so far.

Until next time!


	4. Chapter 4

Like I said in my previous chapter, this one will have less action and is

more character-focused.

Hope you´ll still enjoy it.

 **Chapter 4: A usual day in a unusual world**

The medical center of Greymalkin wasn´t the best, that money can buy, but it was still good enough to patch men and women back together after a hard mission.

Three individuals were now sitting in the wooden cabin, which had room for eight patients at once.

"Ooooh, my head...", Overdrive whimpered miserably to himself.

"Would you please stop whining? We´re just two minutes here and you made me already miss Speed Demon. If you say 'Ouch, my head' one more time, I´ll rip it off your shoulders!", Sabretooth grunted annoyed.

"Ooooohh..."

"Say it one more time! I dare you, I double dare you!"

Suddenly Skye interrupted their banter before someone could get hurt: "Calm own, Vic. Or do you want to get thrown over the cliff? I´m pretty sure Nat or Luke won´t hesitate if they would find out."

"Just sayin´...", he grumbled.

Now the door opened and a middle-aged man with short brown hair, dressed in a dark blue suit wearing sunglasses stood in it.

"Coulson!", Skye happily exclaimed. Still with a shaky balance, she stood up and greeted her former SHIELD-mentor happily, a role he still fills out.

"Skye! Good to see, that you all made it..." His eyes fell on a still over-dramatic Overdrive.

"At least some of you. Is he okay?"

Sabretooth simply nodded, peeved by the man with the helmet. Phil Coulson was now confusingly staring at the cat-like mutant too and wondered: "Mr. Creed, I´m surprised to find you here. Doesn´t make your healing factor your stay here unnecessary?"

The tall man stood up and faced the much shorter one, grunting: "I could ask you the same, Coulson. You don´t look to me like you need a doctor. Yet!"

The former agent looked into the savage eyes, answering with a dry reply: "At least I´m not wrong, if I would need one. But sadly we have no veterinarian for you here."

Overdrive stopped his over-dramatic behavior as he heard this and rose up to sit on the bed he lay on. Skye watched in shock at both men, expecting the worst. Phil and Victor had still their stare-down, the former agent with a more relaxed expression than the one of the former Weapon X-mutant. After a short snarl the latter left the cabin, stating he has more important things on his mind.

Without being noticed by Sabretooth, Coulson´s mouth widen to a large grin of victory.

"Jeez, you could literally grab the testosterone from the air between you two...", Skye remarked sightly relieved that nothing more happened.

"What was he doing here, anyway?", he asked slightly confused but still with his characteristic smile on his face.

"The same as you: looking after us, if we´re fine. What we are, by the way.", she smiled and earned several quick, agreeing nods by Overdrive.

Keeping his smile Phil patted Skye on her shoulder and said to both: "But keep resting. Don´t get too careless."

###

"They should´ve been already here by now!", Luke Cage stated impatient, arms crossed.

He was standing at the entrance of the base and looked into the natural environment around it. The forest was nearly shining in bright green accompanied by peaceful whistling sounds of different kinds of birds living in it. But this was not the reason the former Hero for Hire watched into it.

"I´m sure they´re fine, Luke.", Jessica Drew, now dressed in casual street-wear commented.

"They better are.",was his slight worried answer.

Nearly five more minutes passed as some kind of black cloud opened itself in front of them.

It was Cloak´s name-giving clothing that opened and functioned as some kind of portal, like it did before on the bridge, saving Widow´s team that way. Out of his dark force came the blonde and completely white costumed Dagger and three other individuals, together with a awful lot of boxes filled with food and drinkable liquids.

One if the other persons was a man in his late-twenties with short blonde hair and a small goatee of the same color. He wore a dark red and orange colored uniform, that had a bright yellow flame-symbol on it´s chest. To his left was a woman around the same age with long shoulder-long, brown hair. She wore simple jeans and a dark red shirt with a dark brown jacket over it, holding hands with a child around the age of six. The little girl was dressed in dark purple pullover with some stars on it, dark blue jeans and a pink headgear on her brown curls. Her mocha-skinned face made a bright and happy expression as she exclaimed: "Daddy!"

The child ran into the welcoming arms of her greeting father, who said with a wide smile: "Dani! Have you kept good care of mommy and the others? Especially Johnny, since he usually gets lost in the toy department."

"Haha, Luke. So funny, I nearly started to smile genuinely...", the blonde man called Johnny said monotone.

"Ooooh, someone´s salty.", the non-costumed Spider-Woman mocked. "And he´s usually such a _bright_ guy."

"Don´t worry, Jess. The view of you already has brighten up my mood.", he suddenly chuckled flirtatious and winked with his left eye at her, which let her roll her eyes.

The jacket-wearing woman and mother of Dani was now greeting her husband Luke with a soft kiss and said jokingly to him: "You look troubled again. The wrinkles will never get out of your bulletproof skin, you know?"

The proud father was still holding his little daughter as he answered his wife with a happy smile:

"C´mon, Jessica. Is a man not allowed to worry about the people he loves?" Instead of an answer he earned another kiss from the former private investigator Jessica Jones, which was commented by their daughter with a fake retch.

"Okay, everyone: TIME FOR DINNER!", Johnny Storm, the Human Torch yelled across the base.

Around fifty to sixty people of all sizes, ages and races came from all directions of the base.

The blonde man was now helping Cloak and Dagger to hand out the boxes to the families.

Each family got one box with groceries that would provide them for a week.

Jessica Drew always enjoyed it in some way to see how all these people living with them on this base were receiving their provisions. All this gratefulness and hope in their faces. They felt save around the heroes. Secure like they were back in their childhood, without any worries. Because they knew what the heroes did for them, what they sacrificed for them. Back at that fateful day, some people changed their mind about costumed vigilantes. They realized how dark the world is without anyone who protects them from dangers, that no ordinary human could face. To Jess´ surprise was the fact that even J. Jonah Jameson had changed his opinion about their activities, especially about these of Peter. Somehow she was happy for him, that he finally got the appreciation he always deserved, but the bitter taste was bigger, that it had to happen under these circumstances.

She looked through the many different faces in the crowd standing in front of Johnny and the duo that were somewhat human versions of day and night. All different kind of people were eyed by her:

A middle-aged, Caucasian man, who was a bit chubby and had not that much hair on his head. A young Afro-American woman, who had a striking pink piercing at her lower lip.

Another man in his early-twenties caught her attention by his black cap with a small green cloverleaf on it. But there was one girl who stood out from all these people, at least for Jessica.

A mocha-skinned girl around the age of thirteen or fourteen with dark brown, nearly black shoulder-long hair stood there, wearing a light blue t-shirt with a well-known logo on it. It was a yellow lightning-bolt. The same Jess´ best friend had a long time ago on her costume, when she still called herself 'Ms Marvel'. It was a strange feeling for the civilian Spider-Woman to see this again. But it wasn´t the first time, she saw it. This girl caught her attention from the very first day she came to that base, simply because she wore different colored variations of it before. The face of the young girl looked tired and exhausted in a staggered way, when her family arrived here. Everyone in this new world looked like this when they came here at first, but her expression seemed especially crushed.

Jess watched as the young girl walked to her mother, who wore a headscarf. The woman saw the heroine watching them and gave a warm and honest smile, which was answered with the same facial manifestation. When they were out of sight, Jess sighed and walked off.

###

"Okay, Rhodey. I´m done. This little upgrade will make your chair much more than just...well, a chair.", Peter explained as he lay down some tools.

James Rhodes was sitting in his hovering chair, which got some new toys. Toys that were hidden inside of it. But Peter had a simple solution to get them on the outside.

"This little fella here will activate your armor. But it will also provide you with infrared lights, a small gun, little grenades and, my favorite, your own War Machine signal, that is useful to dazzle your enemies!" In his hand was a small remote control, with just two buttons on it, one gray, the smaller one black. His finger pointed at it: "And this button is just for emergencies! So please don´t press it!"

Slightly skeptical the Colonel looked at the spider and asked: "Is there something that this thing

 _can_ ´ _t_ do?"

"Don´t expect it to do your taxes. But all in all, imagine it like that remote in this Adam Sandler movie, but better because it´s without Adam Sandler.", the spider quipped.

"But I still get Christopher Walken?"

"Noooo, don´t think so..."

"Than it isn´t better.", Rhodey argued mockingly.

"' _Thank you, Peter for making me a deadly R2-D2 that won´t be beeped out!'_ is all I wanted to hear, but _nooo_...", he did as he was insulted.

Natasha, who was standing besides them all the time, quipped with a impish smile: "Oh, Rhodey. Now you made him mad!"

The former armored Avenger raised his hands in a defensive way and said: "I´m sorry, but I think

I´m in a position to voice some wishes." He added in a childish tone: "And I want Christopher Walken!"

"Man, I wonder if Tony ever had to struggle with this. I should _beep_ you out...", Peter murmured as he put his tools away. Behind them was the Vision still scanning the mysterious living being in the tube. He turned towards the three others and commented mannerly: "Regarding your inquiry,

Mr Parker: Negative, Mr Stark never had to face such behavior by Colonel Rhodes during his lifespan. And I doubt that 'beeping him out', how you called it, would change it in any aspect."

Natasha and Rhodey chuckled at this, especially when Peter raised his arms and exclaimed:

"Jeez, you guys are worse than Flash Thompson. At least he wasn´t a smart-ass, just an ass!"

"Oh, c´mon, Pete. You know we just do this, because we love you.", another female voice chuckled.

It was Jessica Drew standing in the door of Peter´s sparsely equipped 'laboratory'. She had a wide grin on her face and asked Black Widow: "You started to bully him without me? You know I want to be part of it!"

"Next time, when Rhodey annoys him I´ll call you.", the red-head joked.

"Please, girls. Ever heard of solidarity between spiders?", Peter said. Rhodey was already on his way out as he had to laugh out at Jess´answer: "We´re both female spiders. We eat our males, already forgot that?"

With pressed eyes and crossed arms he grumbled: "This is why we both were never a couple."

Natasha left the lab with a impish grin. Peter sat down at a metallic table and looked at the scanned data, he received from Vision on a still functioning computer. But this machine was no competition to anything that Peter ever used before the world went downhill. Jess walked towards him. She stood behind her sitting male counterpart and placed her hands on his shoulders.

"Petey.", she sang. "Could you do me a favor?"

"After you bullied me? Why should I?", he answered fake-insulted.

Now she wrapped her arms around his neck and leaned her head against his, stating in a pleading tone: "Please, Petey...pleeeeaaasse. I know you would never leave a friend behind."

"Are you secretly a super-villain now? Because that´s how you sound like..."

"Petey!"

"Okay, okay! What is it, Jess?", he asked defeated. He always enjoyed their little banter.

"You remember how you said I can talk to you about everything?"

"Jess, that was just yesterday, of course I remember."

"Well,", she started and sat on the table on his left. "You remember that family we saved just like a week ago? Those, that came from New Jersey."

Now Peter leaned back into his chair and spin it slightly to face her: "Yes. The Khans, right?"

"Right.", the British woman said. "Since they were here, their daughter always caught my attention. Kamala is her name. She always wears shirts with..." She struggled to finish her sentence. The loss of her best friend was now long ago and she accepted it how it was. But it doesn´t mean that there was no pain anymore.

"With Carol´s logo on it, right?", Peter finished her sentence. He stood up and looked at the woman, whose head now hang down. "Jess, where is this heading?"

She looked up and faced him. Her teared up, emerald eyes were now visible as she said:

"I talked to her parents. Really nice people. They explained me how much Carol meant to Kamala. She was her idol. Kamala always wanted to be like her, when she grows up. Her shirt-collection was not the only thing she had. They told me about the life-size poster she had of her. Her father did not approve of this at first, because it was Carol´s black suit, that was kinda revealing..."

Peter chuckled: "Yeah, I always loved that costume. It was unique."

Jess smiled, still with tears in her eyes: "Of course you would like it. We all knew you had a huge crush on her."

"What? No, no, no...I have no idea what you mean."

"Come on. Logan, Steve, Clint, me...we all could see it. And she liked you, too. Though she had a hard time expressing it. Feelings were never her strong side. But I get off track: The poster. After a while they accepted it because their daughter found a great role model. Her costume became for them just a symbol of her self-confidence as a woman, that was used to protect the innocent. To help those in need."

"I never got it when people criticized one of our costumes. As long as we save the world, everything should be fine, right? I mean: the Amazing Bag-Man was the greatest thing ever!", he chuckled.

Jessica laughed out loud: "Yeah, definitely." Now she continued in a more serious note:

"Kamala was probably Carol´s biggest fan ever. When she saw how her hero..." Jess had to choke for a moment. Again she had to fight her tears.

Peter had watered eyes, too. He remembered Carol´s fearful expression when she died. But not because she feared her own death. Because she feared that she would kill her two closest friends in the team. He walked towards Jess, who saw that he also had some tears in his face now. Both hugged each other to spend comfort to each other.

"What has this to do with the favor, you wanted to ask for?", he said, still holding her.

"I wanted to ask you if we could make it possible for Kamala to spend the evening with us. You know, some quality time with heroes to cheer her up."

They parted now and Peter said: "Wow, you´re a bully with heart! Of course. That´s a great idea. I think Johnny brought some games from their latest supply mission. And tonight will be like old times."

"Urgh, I have to spend the evening with Johnny?", she commented.

"Don´t be that hard. He just likes you more than the rest of us.", Peter quipped.

"What?", Jessica yelled shocked.

"Could be worse. Be glad it´s not Wade."

"Mr Parker?", Vision´s voice interrupted. "It seems that your conversation about past events, especially emotional ones, caught the attention of our guest. It seems that it reacts to deep emotions in general." Peter and Jessica walked to his side and watched at the being in the tube. It simply gazed towards them with it´s expressionless face. Now the male spider-hero rushed to the PC and looked at the scans.

"The data is _wow_. Sorry, but I don´t know how else I should describe it. But it really looks like that the emotions of people influence it´s radiation level. It reacts to it.", the bearded man said excited.

The big face of the Sentinel now looked through the door, that lead into the hangar, which was the only room big enough for him. " _Destroy?_ "

Peter ran towards him and said: "Rover, buddy! We found something about our guest that is simply groundbreaking!"

He turned back to Vision and Jessica: "Guys, we could probably find out from where it is. Maybe it can lead us to a new save haven. A new utop-"

His happy mood was now interrupted by the sounds of crashing metal behind him. When he turned around he saw Rover slamming his metal fists on the ground.

"ROVER? WHAT ARE YOU DOING?", the non-costumed Spider-Man yelled in shock.

" _Destroy!_ ", was the Sentinel´s answer.

Vision calmly translated: "It seems our colossal friend thought your loudly verbalized 'groundbreaking' was a command he was supposed to follow."

Jessica chuckled as Peter cried out: "What? NO. Rover! We talked about this! What are going to do next? Why don´t you destroy our only tank?" He gestured towards the vehicle that was brought in by Overdrive when he finished his sarcastic remark. Without any hesitation Rover stomped on it and left nothing more like flat pieces of metal.

"ROVER!"

"Mr Parker, do I have to remind you, that understanding your advanced level of sarcasm is not part of Rover´s programming?"

Jessica nearly died of laughter when she saw Peter´s face of desperation.

###

Black Widow was now outside. She liked it to be in the forest on her own. Especially during the night, when nobody would interrupt her train of thought. But not this night. She heard two well-known male voices arguing with each other.

She followed the direction they came from and saw Sabretooth sitting on Deadpool, holding him in a tight choke-hold. The bestial man slammed the head of the merc on the ground and grunted:

"Next time, Wade, don´t make it to obvious when you try to get me killed!"

"Ahh, be serious, Simba. Little bullets won´t kill you." Deadpool´s head now got shaken.

"I´m not talking about your goddamn bullets! I was talking about this penance strike or whatever it was called!"

"Stare. Penance stare! Get your facts right before you start an outcry.", the red and black masked man quipped.

"SHUT UP!". Sabretooth yelled in anger and threw him into the next tree.

Deadpool landed uneasy on his head, but he still spoke up: "Oh, man. On the internet you wouldn´t stand a chance."

"I said SHUT UP!"

The blonde man now raced towards Wade and stroke him down with a tackle, that would make every coach of a football-team proud. Both crashed through the tree, surrounded by scattered pieces of wood. "Ahhh...Timber...", Deadpool exclaimed weak. He stood up and saw Victor leaping towards him with extended claws, letting out a mighty roar.

Deadpool pulled out his katana and rammed into the shoulder of his attacker. Another powerful thunder came out of Victor´s lungs as he ripped it out of his wound and sliced Wade open with a quick upwards motion.

"Not fair! You already have claws!", the merc quipped and used his second katana against his opponent. Both blades now hit each other several times.

"You need to try harder. Grumpy Cat!", Deadpool said.

Suddenly Sabretooth´s free hand buried itself into Wade´s chest as the brutish mutant grunted:

"I know you won´t die, Wilson! But I need to teach you a lesson: Never, _never_ try to get me killed again!" His buried paw lifted the red and black covered man and slammed him into the ground, tearing out some parts of his rips.

"Oh, shit! Seems this one took inspiration from Mortal Kombat, am I right?", Deadpool said.

With his free hand he punched the blonde man´s chin, who answered with another slash with his claws.

But suddenly both men felt electricity running through their muscles. Small stingers shocked their mutated bodies and let them drop on the floor.

"You both are worse than two bridesmaids fighting over a bunch!"

Natasha saw everything and had enough of it.

"Since our small trip you both are trying to rip each other´s hearts out...more than usual."

She slowly walked around both men, who were laying on the ground and shaking by the electrical energy running through them. As always Wade tried to say something:

"Hheee...triedd-" A small bolt interrupted him.

Widow smiled as she looked down at both and commented: "I should do this more often."

She sat down on the trunk of the fallen tree. Her eye wandered calculating from one man to another. It was amusing to see Sabretooth and Deadpool shaking on the ground like two fishes without any water, she had to admit that. But this was serious:

"I know what Victor did, Wade. I know the reason you always try to get him killed. And you won´t like what I have to say..."

"Thhree...wwaa-", Wade tried to ask.

Black Widow stood up and walked towards them. Towering over both laying men she told the one in red and black: "We depend on each other. _You_ depend on each other. This is not like it ever was before. There is no time and place to hold a grudge against someone who is playing in the same team as you. I know what crimes Victor committed in the past.." Now her eye was shortly focused on the mutant before she went back to the mercenary. "Terrible crimes he´ll definitely have to take the consequences for. But not know! Not when the world is still such a mess. Everyone who is not willing to live in our current tyranny is important to make our dream of a free world come true. This is the only reason you two are here. Parker cannot stand you. Both of you, because of the things you did and are willing to do. But he knows how much value you have for our nearly impossible success." She turned around and made her way to the base before she added:

"Wade, I´m sorry for what he did to Vanessa many years ago. But killing each other won´t help you.

And it won´t help anyone else, too. We need both of you. Well and alive!"

Walking away and nearly vanishing into the shadows of the forest, she pushed a small button to stop her stingers from emitting electricity into both former Weapon X agents.

Sabretooth and Deadpool were slowly rising up. Their wounds already healed when Victor grunted:

"She´s right..."

"Ooooohhh, of course she´s right, because her statement saves your puny, hairy ass! But guess what, fur ball: I will never, _never_ forgive or forget how you killed `Nessa. And you being a team-player around heroes like Spidey, Torch, her or Cage? Sorry, won´t buy it!"

The merc collected all his belongings while Sabretooth still sat there.

"Victor, since your introduction in _Iron Fist #14_ in the August of 1977, you´ve been a feral, bestial brute. I on the other hand have been characterized in some more sympathetic ways than you. On some occasions I even respect the lives of others. Something you never did!"

With that said, Deadpool left his old enemy back, who grunted in a low voice:

"I have no idea what exactly you said...but I get your point." His eyes were now focused on the scars he still had from his battles with the Thorns. He wondered why his hands still haven´t healed yet before he added: "You´re right, Natasha. My punishment will come..."

###

"Where´s Natasha?", Jessica Jones asked, wearing now her pink shirt and light blue shorts she always wears late in the evening. Or night. Besides her was Daisy Johnson, who answered:

"Still outside. I think together with Wade and Vic."

"Good! I don´t want these both psychos in any room together with Dani!"

Both were in a huge lounge, together with many other heroes. At the table were Johnny Storm, Jessica Drew, Laura Kinney and Luke Cage with his daughter Danielle on his lap sitting at a wooden table and playing Texas Hold ´Em. Phil Coulson and Vision were standing in the back and were having a chat about old times. Overdrive, Cloak and Dagger were sitting on a couch in front of a table and watching one of the DVDs they had found on the base, a old copy of the very first

'Lethal Weapon'. And in the kitchen they could hear the voices of Peter and a unknown, young female.

"Don´t be too hard to them, Jessica. They went through a lot, like the rest of us. Even before they became what they are now.", Daisy said.

"Yeah, but we never enjoyed killing like they did.", Jones exclaimed before she went into the kitchen to get something to drink. In there she saw Peter wearing casual clothing and a young girl around the age of thirteen, having dark hair and wearing a yellow shirt with a black lightning-bolt on it.

The young girl asked excited the non-costumed Spider-Man: "Is it that true that you denied many offers by the Avengers to join them? Why would you do that? They were the greatest team ever!"

He answered: "Let´s say, back then I was more that kind of person you would consider as a loner. Playing in a team and taking orders by others was not my style..."

Jessica Jones poured some water into her glass and joked: "Yeah, Mr Parker over there was a total lone wolf. He was to bad-ass for anyone."

Peter answered with a fake laugh and told the girl: "Don´t believe anything she´s telling you, Kamala."

"Mr Amazing over here was a perfect example of a nerd. Always his glasses-carrying nose deeply buried into his books. And don´t get me started about his style of clothing.", the former private investigator chuckled when she took a small sip from her glass.

Peter opened a door of the cupboard to look for some food and murmured: "Just when I thought I already got my daily dose of 'Parker-bashing'..."

Kamala asked Jessica in awe: "Is it true that you went together to High School? And he inspired you to become 'Jewel'?"

Jessica smiled and answered: "Yeah. And to his own bad luck, he didn´t knew I had a secret crush on him back then. He never realized it. Like I said, total nerd. But now he is out of the question."

"Pfft. There is no contest for me...", he grunted behind the door.

"Babe! Did you hear that?", Jessica yelled to the next room. From it answered Luke´s voice:

"Yup. You wanna re-think that, Pete?"

Peter rose up behind the door and said excusing: "Except you, Luke. Of course. I would never put your in masculinity in question!"

"Ahh, now we´re talking the same language.", came the reply from the other room, followed by other voices slightly chuckling at this.

Jessica left the kitchen and commented towards Kamala: "Torture him with your questions. Like he always tortures us with his constant babbling. And by the way: I love your shirt."

Kamala said fangirling towards Peter: "Did you hear that? She loves my shirt! Jessica Jones loves my 'Ms Marvel'-shirt!"

Peter smiled genuinely at this, because it reminded him of his early months as New York´s web-slinger, every time he met one of his idols like Captain America or Iron Man.

Kamala continued: "You never realized that she had a crush on you? Do you regret it? And what about the other heroines you dated? Like Black Cat? Which was in my opinion a bit slutty for you, but still a great catch..." Her fingers rubbed her own chin, while he nearly choked at a piece of an apple he was just eating, because of her statement about Cat.

"Is it true that you and Carol Danvers once dated? And what have you done wrong that a second date never happened? In my opinion you were the dream couple from all super hero-couples out there! Even better than the Richards or-"

"Woah, woah. Hold your breath, little lady.", Peter interrupted her in a friendly tone with a confused expression. Both were now back in the lounge and the rest could hear their talk.

"How did you knew about our date? And why had it to be my mistake? It could have easily been hers, too. Which wasn´t the case, but-"

The other Jessica in the room, Ms Drew said: "Everybody heard about 'the Amazing Spider-Date' months after it. You just missed that TV-interview in which Carol mentioned it. And don´t worry: None of you made any mistakes." She had a warm smile on her face and looked at a over-excited Kamala, who said: "OMG! You are Spider-Woman!"

She raced towards her and hugged her.

"Wow!", Jess said surprised.

Kamala let go and said worried: "I´m sorry, I-"

"It´s okay. I just didn´t expected that reaction.", the female non-costumed spider-hero laughed.

Now Kamala turned her face towards the male one and said in a nearly death-serious manner:

"And how does it come that _you_ both haven´t become a couple yet?"

Peter´s eyes widen in shock and confusion. At the same time Cage, both Jessicas and Johnny burst out in tears of laughter. Even X-23 had a huge smile on her face as Peter asked loudly:

"Are you trying to turn my life into a harem or what?"

"Ohh, you haven´t read my most successful fanfiction about you yet: 'Spider-Man and his Amazing Girlfriends'"

Jess, the Spider-Woman added still laughing: "Oooohh, I need to read this!"

###

Natasha came back from the forest. When she walked towards the main house where everyone else was present, she eyed Rhodey hovering high in the air with his chair and Rover standing on a basketball pitch.

"Rover. That was the fourth ball you busted. And we only have two left!"

The Sentinels head lowered itself and said disappointed by himself: " _Destroy!_ "

The former War Machine went through a box with two Basketballs inside of it and took one.

He saw Black Widow and greeted her: "Hey, Natasha! Wanna help me to teach Rover how to play?"

"Aren´t you worried that someone will see him? He is not something you can hide in your pocket."

"Don´t worry. Peter and Vision gave him some stealth plates from one of the old, useless Blackbirds down in the hangar. Nobody will see him.", Jim Rhodes reassured her.

She shrugged and smiled: "Why not? Give me the ball." He passed it to her.

"Hey, big boy!", she yelled towards Rover. He looked at her and asked in his typical manner to receive her reply: "I have no idea what the Colonel taught you, but I´m sure you can easily dribble the ball." She dropped the ball down and let it recoil back into her hand and repeated it several times.

"You really try _that_? I doubt he has the tact for that...", Rhodey asked uncertain. Widow turned towards him with an expression that promised him to witness a miracle.

Turned back towards Rover and repeating her motion she said: "See, Rover? That´s how you have to do it. Not with much force. Only with soft motions. Now try it!"

She passed the ball to the machine, which caught it with it´s open palm. It was slightly hovering, thanks to a small amount of energy. Rover slowly turned his hand and tried it as Widow showed him. With slow motions it perfected the dribbling faster than anyone present anticipated.

"Great, Rover! Go on!", Rhodey stated excited.

"He learns faster as I imagined.", the red-haired Russian commented.

Rover´s hand moved up and down in exponentially faster motions. Suddenly the ball missed his hand and shot up into the dark sky.

Rhodey, Natasha and the learning Sentinel looked up and watched the ball until it was impossible to see it anymore. They stood there like that for several moments before Rhodey commented:

"Well...we still have _one_ ball."

"That wasn´t bad, Rover. With some more practice, we´ll teach you how to throw the ball into the basket without destroying it.", Widow said to the giant robot. Then she turned towards Rhodey and said:

"You should do this on a daily basis. He could become the next Dirk Nowitzki or Michael Jordan."

She chuckled as Rhodey answered: "Oh, can you already see how he and the kids will win the championship? That´ll be the way we stop Doom and the others."

"What? With some 'Mighty Ducks' logic?", suddenly a annoying voice yelled. It was Deadpool, of course, coming out of the forest, too.

"What´s going on? Are we decorating our 'Iron Giant' for Christmas? A bit early, considering this was written in June..."

"What is it, Wade?", Rhodey asked annoyed, which was followed by Rover´s curious " _Destroy?_ "

"Just thought that it would be a good moment to make me relevant for the plot again." He looked at Widow and added: "You know, I thought about the words you spoke. Aaaaaand I´m not sure what to think about it. You know, my desire to let Sabretooth meet his maker is huge, but both of us being so valuable-"

Suddenly something hit his head hard and knocked the merc out. Besides him was now the basketball jumping away.

"Oh, it finally came back!", Rhodey exclaimed grateful.

Even Rover commented on a happy note: " _Destroy!_ "

###

Cage with Dani on his lap, Jess, Laura and Johnny were still having their small round of

Texas Hold ´Em. Luke´s wife, the other Jessica talked to Coulson about their rations for the week and Willis, their supplier who has to think about leaving San Francisco, because some Thorns visited him.

She looked at the table with the still playing individuals. X-23 was already out of the game, but mostly because she didn´t liked it to play and enjoyed it more to watch the others. Especially when Johnny was getting intense, like now.

"You can´t be serious! You have to be cheating! You always get what you need or your bluffs make a fool out of me!", Johnny nearly yelled.

"I don´t need bluffs to make you a fool, you already are.", Spider-Woman chuckled. "But I have to admit, my pheromones are helpful."

Jessica Drew was always able to emit some pheromones, that could easily distract any man and make him 'her own'. Johnny looked shocked at her and exclaimed: "Don´t use your pheromones, Jess! Not fair!"

Laura could smell that Jess was lying and just said it to confuse Johnny. But Dani had mercy and ended the game with a Royal Flush.

"Sweet Christmas!", she expressed joyful.

"That´s my baby!", the proud father said as he gave Dani a high five. Jessica Jones shook her head and asked rhetorically: "Don´t tell me you taught her that, Luke."

"She knows what a cool catchphrase is.", he laughed.

Johnny raised an eyebrow and added: "Seriously, Luke? This is soooo 1970´s."

"No sense for classics, huh. That´s why it´s going downhill...", Luke crossed his arms.

"Well, it would, if it didn´t already happened...", Spider-Woman remarked.

Their banter was interrupted by Jessica and Phil who asked them: "Could somebody tell us where we can find our leader?"

X-23 answered: "He brings Kamala back to her parents. He will return any moment."

Her sentence was not even finished few seconds ago as the man in question entered the room. Luke and Jessica told Danielle to go to bed now, what the girl did. Even in a dystopian state the world is currently in, listening to her parents was still something she had to do.

When she was in her room, Peter simply shrugged: "Okay, when you send her away, it´s serious. What´s the matter?"

Jones started: "Willis is making trouble. He said he will cut our supplies if he thinks our protection is not good enough. He told me that some Thorns visited him..."

"They never visited him. Why now?", Peter asked sternly.

Coulson commented: "It´s possible that our small heist at the Triskelion caused a bigger stir we expected. And now they´re searching us in every bigger city."

"Well, admittedly our small heist hasn´t been that small how it was intended to be. But when they already search in the bigger cities for us, no twelve hours after it happened..."

Johnny and the others were still sitting at the table when he asked: "Where are you driving at, Spidey?"

"I _think_..." Parker raised his finger. "that our unknown friend down in my lab has much more importance to Kingpin than just being his source of electricity for one of his biggest bases. He´s probably afraid that Doom, Viper and the other tyrants could find out about his little lamp. Maybe he wants to use it against them. Vision?"

The android man now faced the unmasked wall-crawler. The latter asked: "You said it was incomplete?"

"Positive, Mr Parker. Like I said before, it is comparable to a phantom pain. Or a mother searching her missing children."

Now Luke added: "Pete, are you implying that Fisk and his shrew have some more like this hidden in their 'Kingdom'?" Even Cloak, Dagger and Overdrive were now looking to them.

Their leader then said: "Possible. I know Kingpin for a long time now. And this seems like something that he would do. Hiding all important pieces in different locations. And when his fellow 'royals' find out what he´s storing here, could this lead into another World War. So he waits for the best opportunity to strike them all at once."

Silence filled the room for a moment until Jessica Drew spoke up:"What´s your plan, Pete?"

He looked up. His eyes wandered from each individual in the room to the next one. Then he said:

"Jessica Jones, Cloak, Dagger and Luke will visit Mr Willis and tell him that Phil, Skye,Victor and me will go to the docks near the bridge and search for a new hideout for him."

"Why is Mr Creed part of this mission?", Coulson asked somewhat bothered, but still being professional, like his SHIELD-training taught him.

"Because he always gives me the feeling that he doesn´t want to be here and I would like to see how he fares in a mission. Nat told me that his work his good, but I would like to see it for myself. And to be honest..." now his eyes were focused on the married couple in the group before he looked back to both former agents. "I think some people wouldn´t like the idea having him _and_ Wade around the kids. And one psycho to leave here is kinda risky enough. And both together on a mission proved to be a difficult task for them."

Johnny and Jess were now looking reassuring towards their best friend and said: "Don´t worry.

We´ll keep Wade in check." Added to this was a agreeing nod by X-23 and a 'thumbs-up' by Overdrive.

"Okay, guys. Seems like tomorrow will be a long day."

###

And so ends chapter 4!

There was not much action going on, but I still hope you liked it.

This chapter was for the purpose to show who is living in this Dystopia and how they are living in there. I will deepen into it in the following chapters, but don´t worry, there will be more action next time.

To avoid possible questions:

Many things in this universe are very, _very_ similar to the 616-Marvel Universe (the main one)

But I took some liberties, too:

Why Victor alias Sabretooth is helping the heroes and why he and Overdrive haven´t been part of

the man-slaughtering army will be explained in future chapters.

And yes, like in the main MU Sabretooth is responsible for the death of Vanessa, who was also in the Deadpool movie Wade´s girlfriend.

Kamala Khan´s story is very different in this but she stays basically the same character. I included her, because from all of the new heroes Marvel created in the recent 5 to 6 years, she is one of the few I actually like (besides Blue Marvel, who is really great, and Manifold and Silk, who are awesome, too)

She has no powers in this universe yet. But I already thought of a way to give her them.

Different from 616 and more taken from the MCU is Coulson´s role as Skye´s father-figure.

Mr Willis is an Original Character created by me. He´ll just have a minor role and have his first appearance in the next chapter.

So far, until next time, true believers! :D


	5. Chapter 5

Another chapter that is more about the characters, but it´ll also have some action, too.

It took a bit longer, because I had a hard case of 'writer´s block'.

 **Chapter 5: Under the sun of San Francisco**

The City by the Bay is known for the world famous Golden Gate Bridge and the city´s mostly Victorian architecture. But most of the buildings have been destroyed during the huge earthquake in 1906. Only a few of the so called 'Victorians' survived it. And even less of them survived the massive attack by an army of super villains five years ago.

In the ruins of one of these was now a small shop, supplying people in the city with food. Owner of this shop was a man of average size and with some smaller scars at his left cheek.

His eyes were light green, but his red veins were visible, probably coming from drinking too much alcohol. Tattoos covered his strangely pale arms and a dark purple scarf was around his neck. Besides the hot temperatures outside he also wore a sleeveless, but still heavy, black vest with a hood on his head. His jeans had several holes in it and his black sneakers have also seen better days.

Currently the man, simply called Mr Willis, even if it wasn´t his real name, was counting some mandarins in a box. Suddenly a dark cloud emitted the room. Out of it came Luke Cage, Jessica Jones, Cloak and Dagger.

"For Jesus´s fucking sake! Never scare the shit outta me like that!", Willis´smokey voice said in shock, holding his hand on his chest like he had a heart attack.

Jessica flinched an eyebrow and commented: "Come on, Willis. Your heart isn´t that weak. And you´ve seen worse..."

"Oh hell yeah, I have!", the shop-owner ranted. "Like yesterday, when these fucking hotheads showed up here! Haven´t seen such fucked up kiss-deflectors since the last time Halloween was celebrated! And I´m not talking about masks! These faces were worse than things you saw on Hentai conventions!"

Luke now looked questioningly into the eyes of his wife and asked: "You bring our daughter here on a regular basis, but you think Deadpool and Sabretooth are bad influences?"

She just chuckled at him: "Well, at least he´s not a psychopathic killer."

Mr Willis now spoke up again: "It´s possible I fall into the hands of one if you don´t help me! These motherfuckers were paying me a visit! I expect you-"

His rant was now interrupted by the Afro-American man mountain, wearing a typical yellow shirt:

"Listen, moron! We´re here to help you!"

The man with the black hood and dark purple scarf raised his arms and exclaimed: "Great! And how the fuck are you planning to do so?"

"Don´t get brash, or we won´t pay our supplies anymore!", Cage added.

"You pay your supplies by _protecting me_ , bowling head! Has done fucking wonders to me!"

Jessica just rubbed her eyes in a annoyed matter and said: "This will be harder than I thought. And Luke, you´re not a big help..."

He stared at her and defended himself: "In all honesty, babe. You haven´t told me we don´t pay our supplies with money! A memo would´ve been nice before I get into a embarrassing moment like this!"

" _Babe_? Don´t tell me this goof-ball is your husband, Jonesey...", Willis added surprised.

"What´s THAT supposed to mean, vocal car crash?", Cage furiously asked.

"You know what I mean. And most people compare my voice to Joe Cocker´s, so shut up!"

"Enough of this!", Jessica yelled. "We´ve got enough problems, so getting onto each others throats won´t help! Willis! We´re here to tell you that our group is working on a solution of your problem! Another team is searching for a new base for your 'shop'! If everything goes well, you´ll have a new home _tonight_!"

Willis just crossed his arms and his glare wandered from one individual in front of him to another until he asked: "Earlier is not possible?"

Now Jessica´s eyes widen as she exclaimed: "Earlier? I think tonight _is_ really early! What-"

"I don´t have time until tonight, Jonesey. The Thorns can come back here any time today! And I´ve got that fucking feel that they´ll show up with one of these fucking super-villains this time!"

"Man, what makes you think that?", Cage asked.

"How the fuck should I know? Just call it a feeling in my gut!", the shop-owner´s rusty voice, damaged from years of smoking, yelled.

"A gut-feeling, really?", Luke wondered.

"Ehm, Luke...", Tandy alias Dagger added worried. She and Tyrone alias Cloak stood at one of the windows and had a good view on the street below. "I think he´s not wrong."

Cage and Jones walked towards the window and peeked through it. They saw several Thorns, parking their motorcycles or cars and walking towards the shop.

"Should I warp us out?", Cloak asked.

"No!", said Willis. "They are after the rations. If we just vanish they´ll get what they want, without having the fun of killing me!" He walked to his desk and opened it. From the inside he took out a shotgun and loaded it. With a huge grin the owner said: "I´ll show these fuckers _my_ version of fun!" He lifted his scarf over his lower face and was ready to defend his supplies.

"You heard the man, Ty!", Cage added.

###

Some minutes earlier: Spider-Man, Coulson, Skye and Sabretooth were close the coast, searching a new hide-out for Willis in one of the abandoned warehouses.

They already left two behind, which were not stable enough or occupied by a family of rats. A huge family of rats. Only Skye could prevent Victor from biting the head off of one these, after it bit his leg.

The third time is the charm, they thought as they entered the warehouse. Victor used his heightened senses to avoid another unpleasant surprise. Skye and Spidey were also checking the building, while Phil was standing outside and watched out for possible incoming threats.

"Do we have any real criteria? Besides 'no rats'?", was Skye´s question.

"Well, enough room for Willis to store everything he has. But that won´t be a problem in any of these buildings.", Spidey answered.

They were spreading into different corners of the warehouse. Spider-Man went up to the ceiling to check out the solidity. He crawled some feet and waited if his spider-sense would go off when there would be an unstable part of the roof. When he was sure everything was alright, the wall-crawler prepared himself to jump down on the floor. But suddenly his inner alarm system went slightly off.

Not that much to suspect any danger very close to him, not even in this building. But something – or someone – was there.

At the same time, Sabretooth smelled something. His nasal wings sniffed multiple times. Like a mad man he turned his head into different directions to find out from where this smell came.

The behavior of the animalistc man wasn´t left undetected by Daisy Johnson, who wondered:

"What´s wrong, Vic?"

"We´re not alone!", he snarled. The moment his statement was spoken, Spider-Man landed besides them and remarked: "Good. I thought my spider-sense was going to play it´s games with me. Not that a triggered spider-sense is a good thing..."

Now Phil Coulson also entered the warehouse and closed the door behind him.

"We´re getting company. And they don´t look like they´re just trying to sell something."

"We already thought that. Thorns?", Peter asked sternly.

Coulson answered emotionless: "Not only."

Suddenly Sabretooth cried out in pain. Everyone in the room turned their heads towards him and witnessed how flames emitted from his scarred hands.

"Ehm, that´s new. Didn´t knew Johnny taught you some tricks, Creed.", Spider-Man somewhat 'joked', earning himself a angry growl from the mutant.

"Guys, is this building still in the runner as new hide-out?", Skye asked, pointing towards the wall behind them.

Frozen in shock they saw as the wall slowly burned open and the metal beams around it and stabilizing the building itself were melted to huge metallic puddles. Through the hole came some usual Thorns, but they were also accompanied by three outstanding figures.

One of them was male and wearing a black costume with a dark purple cape and cowl, which covered his face for the most part, only showing his scarred chin. His right hand was covered in something made out of metal which had a big scythe attached to it. His name was Eric Williams, but he preferred Grim Reaper.

Another individual was female and wore a dark green body armor. Only her face and her dark, nearly black hair was uncovered. On her back was a large tail with a deadly stinger at it´s end attached. She was born with the name Elaine Coll, but she only used her given name Scorpia.

The third outstanding person looked like a new variation of the well-known Ghost Rider. But Spidey´s companions weren´t surprised, given that they faced a hellish Speed Demon just yesterday.

But the difference was that he looked even more demonic with all of his bones covered in spikes and equipped with razor-sharp teeth that gave Sabretooth some good competition.

"I told you he would find them.", Scorpia snapped at Reaper, who just shrugged it off.

The new Spirit of Vengeance stepped a bit closer towards the surrounded quartet and growled with his deep, fiendish voice: "I could sense you. Your paws..." He lifted slowly his left hand on pointed with his index finger on Victor burned extremities. "...they kept some essence from the Thorn you killed. Every single one of us is connected. We can sense each other across the continent. We are like an organism that belongs together, but every part has his own mind. We are like a hive. We are one!"

A impatient Grim Reaper stormed towards the former SHIELD-Agents and complained:

"Enough trash-talk, Baldwin! We are here to get these suckers!"

Daisy and Phil dodged the deadly scythe just in time, while Spidey had to fight Scorpia.

Baldwin slowly walked towards Sabretooth and muttered more to himself than to his associate:

"In this form I´m Penance..." He lashed out with his flaming fist, but the mutant caught it with his own hands. An action he started to regret as soon as the flaming skeleton started to heat things up and burning even some skin off Sabretooth´s hands in the process.

"All these sins...", the blazing skull roared.

Spider-Man heard the hairy man shouting in pain, again. Even louder than before. But as much as he wanted, he wasn´t able to help him. Not as long as he was engaged in his own battle with Scorpia. As he dodged her tail he quipped: "You have to actually hit me, if you want to cause some damage! Man, you make me miss the real Scorpion."

"Your stupid remarks won´t irritate me, web-head. I´m not that easy to distract." With that she wiped out again, but also missed again.

"This proves it! Villains Academies train you to miss your targets. Who was your teacher?

Doctor Evil?"

Totally unexpected he also had to dodge now some bullets, shot by some of the Thorns.

"Yikes, totally forgot about these guys..."

Meanwhile Daisy and her mentor also had huge trouble with some of the henchmen and the Grim Reaper. With her powers that granted her the name Quake she was able to keep their enemies in the distance, while Coulson used his small gun, which had not as much an effect as he hoped for.

"Argh, SHIELD...how much I despised you can´t be described with any words...", Eric Williams muttered. He tried to hit Phil with the scythe. With an elegant side-wards steps he avoided being split up in the middle and left the deadly weapon of the hooded villain stuck in the floor.

"Oh, not good...", the Reaper said with a surprised expression before Coulson´s fist hit his nose and knocked him out.

"Well, like I expected from him."

Only a few feet away was Victor Creed fighting for his life. The huge, burning skeleton tossed him around like a rag doll a catapulted him through the wall. After this Penance´s blazing skull slowly turned towards the two trained agents, who were still fighting off Kingpin´s loyal acolytes.

Daisy looked towards the Ghost Rider-like man and gasped as his bloodcurdling voice groaned:

"You stole something. Something that the Kingpin wants back. Give it to me and I´ll spare you!"

She wasn´t sure, but Daisy thought for a moment that she heard honesty out of his voice.

Before she could give him a proper reaction he was hit by a flying Thorn, which was thrown by Spider-Man into the main host of the Spirit of Vengeance.

"Skye! You get Creed outta here. He is no help against a Ghost Rider.", the web-slinger commanded.

"What about you and Phil?", she asked worried.

"What do you think? We´ll keep them away from you as good as possible! Now go!"

Without any further questioning she placed Sabretooth´s left arm on her shoulders and made way for themselves with a seismic wave towards the other side of the building.

Coulson was still fighting off the Thorns surrounding him, one was even unlucky enough to get his jaw kicked off. Close to exhaustion he told the web-head: "The warehouse is only a few moments away from collapsing. What is your plan?"

Spider-Man and Phil were now standing back-to-back and saw Scorpia, some Thorns and the anew awaken Grim Reaper rushing towards them from all sides.

"Ehm...", the masked wonder went through his thought process. He looked up and saw the roof that would come down at them any moment. "We keep them distracted until we´ll get some heavenly help."

"You suggest to pray? I don´t think this an appropriate time to make jokes!", Coulson said dryly as he shot an attacker.

"Wait and see!", Spidey quipped as suddenly started to shoot a huge amount of webbing around himself and the former agent.

The henchmen of the Kingpin were just staring in surprise until Reaper just smiled: "Afraid, isn´t he?"

Scorpia looked up and realized what was going on. "Yeah, but not because of us!" She quickly used he mechanical tail to impale one Thorn standing besides her and shielded herself with his body.

The roof came down and buried everyone inside of the warehouse under it.

A few moments passed until some movement was noticeable under the wreckage. Surrounded by some webbing, Spidey and Coulson came out of the debris and shook off some dust.

"I was never so thankful to be trapped in a web.", Coulson shrugged.

"When there was something in my life as a spiderling I could always count on, it was my web."

The masked individual looked at his cartridges on his wrists. "I just hate it to use so much web-fluid at once. Especially in times like this. But I doubt the good ol´ discus here..." He pointed at the shield on his back. "Could´ve helped us much."

"I agree. We should find Daisy and Creed."

###

At the same time, Jessica Jones, her husband Luke Cage, Cloak, Dagger and the armed shop-owner Mr. Willis had their own trouble.

Moments ago they saw eight or nine Thorns walking towards the building they were in. They heard them walking up the stairs. And they were ready to fight.

But against every expectation the henchmen of the Kingpin didn´t storm through the door. Instead Jessica, Willis and the rest heard voices having a discussion with each other. After some unintelligible words were spoken they the heard stairs a second time, but this time the steps were fading.

"What was that?", Dagger whispered.

Luke just shrugged, knowing as much as her. Willis reloaded his shotgun and grunted: "The first motherfucker that will put his ass in here will lose his kisser." Again Luke shrugged and whispered to his wife: "We really need to talk about bringing Dani here."

From the other side of the door they heard a voice calling: "Mr. Willis! We will enter the room now. Don´t shoot. I repeat: Do NOT shoot!"

Everyone in the room was confused and Jessica asked: "Who does this chick think she is? A cop?"

Again the ominous sounding voice called: "We´re coming in."

All five were ready to attack. But again they got confused as Cloak looked through the window and said: "Ey, those ragtags are leaving!"

"What?", Cage added surprised and walked over to Cloak. His look through the glass confirmed the described scenario.

"Hehehe, afraid, aren´t they?", Willis chuckled but was completely ignored when the door opened slowly.

Through it came a man and a woman, both well-known by the heroes in the room.

The latter was a blue-skinned female with dark red hair. On her forehead was a little hair clip, that looked like a skull. She wore complete black pants, boots, gloves and a mid-riff-free top. Luke and the others knew her as Raven Darkholme, the former mutant terrorist Mystique.

Her companion was much smaller than her and was mostly moving on all four extremities. His dark yellow eyes looked huge and nearly popped out of his head. His brown hair was messy and unwashed while his pale skin had a tinge of green in it. He wore a orange hoodie and teared jeans. His bright red sneakers had seen better times, too. He was known as Mortimer Toynbee alias Toad.

"What do you want, Mystique?", Jessica snarled and clenched her fists.

Mystique walked calm between them and headed towards Willis´ table, on which the box filled with mandarins was still standing. She turned her head towards everyone present and started talking:

"I´m here to help."

Luke just crossed his arms and replied: "Yeah, suuuure. Why should we believe you, sweetheart?"

Toad, who was climbing at the wall behind them just stared at them, not realizing that Willis was pointing his gun towards him and yelled: "Does it fucking matter? Blast ´em!"

The amphibian mutant just leaped over the armed man, landing on the wall behind him. He used his abnormal long tongue and tried to grab the gun with it.

But he didn´t expected Jessica´s hand grabbing it and pulling him over to herself.

Midair she grabbed his face and pressed his mouth together, so that he wasn´t able to use his extended taste-organ again.

Hardly impressed Mystique shrugged and continued calmly like before: "There is _one_ simple reason you should believe me. From whom do you stupid Sapiens think is Victor getting all the information you need ?" She grinned sheepishly and tried hard not to laugh at the facial expressions from the people in front of her.

Luke just blinked and walked closer to her. Before he could reply she grinned: "Yes, Cage. Toad and me, we are your 'mole'! And no, that moralizer you call a 'leader' just because he got the shield, doesn´t know about it. He just knew as much as you did."

The tall Afro-American just stared down at her. Her snake-like, yellow eyes just smiled back at him.

Suddenly Cloak spoke up: "Why do you help us? And why should we keep on trusting you?"

Mystique just walked away from the table and grabbed one of the mandarins. Willis tried to protest, but was stopped by Dagger. The blue-skinned mutant answered: "I always liked the idea of taking over the world. But not under the leadership of wretched Sapiens-scum like Doom, Fisk or Madame Hydra. And Apocalypse and Ultron are far too destructive for a world I imagine. So I thought I let some infos slip through to Sabretooth and hoped that the remains of the Avengers, Defenders or whatever boy scout-club you all were part of called yourselves, to bring down these fools."

Jessica, who was still holding Toad´s mouth shut, glared at her: "And what about your dream of a world ruled by the 'Homo Superior'? It´s hard to believe you, if you´re a well-known mutant terrorist only cooperating with two other mutants with a similar radical way of thinking!"

Mystique was eating from the mandarin she grabbed earlier and walked towards the former P.I..

The sheepish smile on the mutant faded as she explained: "From one mother to another: You would do anything – _anything_ – for your daughter, am I right?" HesitantJessica nodded.

"So let me tell you: I don´t know where my children are. Since the massacre years ago I´ve never heard from them again. Either they died on this day like Danvers, Stark, Rogers, Logan and so on.

Or they were hiding, like you all did all these years. You have no idea how long Kingpin and his bitch were unaware of your existence in his kingdom. It´s hard to keep up with _all_ the things that happen on a huge continent like this, even if it´s completely under your control.

As a mother I just want to find my children, even if they´re already dead. I want the certainty!"

A disparaging sigh was heard and Mystique turned towards it, looking at Dagger who started:

"Since when are running for 'Mother of the Year'? You never really cared about Rogue or Nightcrawler. You just misused them for your ideological missions and beliefs. They had it better without you."

The blue-skinned mutant just stood in front of the blonde haired woman and snarled: "Don´t you dare to question my paternal feelings, you pathetic brat!"

"Stop!", Jessica interfered. She let go of Toad, who just muttered in pain: "Was about bloody time." and leaped off.

Jones flat out said: "Okay. We trust you. For now!"

"We do?", Luke and Willis asked simultaneously.

"Yes. We do. So what is it you wanted to tell us? Why have you stopped the Thorns from entering here and trashing the place?"

"I wanted to tell you about the purple glowing child you´ve found. You already may have found that it is only the part of something bigger."

"What does she mean?", Dagger asked Cloak. Luke answered: "When Vision scanned that huge lava-lamp, he said something about it being 'incomplete' and that it suffered some kind of phantom pain. But how do you know about it, Mystique?"

"It´s easy to enter high-security facilities if you are a shapeshifter like me.", she grinned.

"The thing is: the other parts of her, it or whatever you want to call it...they are spread around the world. Every kingdom has gotten one. And every single one of them is totally different from the others. I can´t tell in which aspects, but as far as I know are not all of them are humanoid."

"So we need to search a pink dog in Doom´s empire, I guess. But what is purpose behind these?", Cage added.

"Every single one of them is a powerful being of it´s own. But their full potential can only be unleashed if they get merged together. So, to create some balance of power, all dictators decided to give each kingdom one of these powers."

"But from where do they come? Who has found this power? And what is it exactly?"

"Well, dear Dagger. Not all questions can be answered. This was all I know so far."

Silence filled the room. Everyone just thought about everything that Mystique just told them, until Willis spoke: "I have no fucking idea what you all were talking about."

"You´re not important. At least both of our couples know it and can give this information to the spider."

Mystique walked towards the door and murmured some other harsh comments before she stopped and added: "And before I forget it: Tomorrow afternoon, there will be a big meeting between all five leaders. Some kind of 'United Nations'-thing or whatsoever. Inside a former SHIELD helicarrier. I thought that could interest you. The Fisks will be gone for at least four days."

With a wicked smile she left and called for Toad, who left with her.

The four heroes and the shop-owner in the room just paused a moment to process the newly gained information. Luke was the one to start talking again: "Tandy. Ty. You both help our cursing merchant to get everything he has back there. Until we know where Spidey and the others found a new place for his shop, he will come to our place." The trio did as they were told.

The former Power Man now faced his wife: "And we need to talk!"

"Hopefully not about Willis´ cursing. There are worse things than that."

"No. I mean about that what just happened. Why did you put your trust into the hands of that woman? She could easily tell Fisk´s fat butt where he can find us and who and how many we are. Why did you believe her story considering Rogue and Nightcrawler?"

"You haven´t seen her face, babe."

"Blue. Scaly. Creepy?"

"No. She had the same expression I had when Dani had been kidnapped by this Skrull years ago."

Now Luke understood why his wife trusted the former terrorist. At least to some extend.

He remembered the feeling he had. The feeling that a father or mother has when something happens to your child and you don´t know anything for certain about their well-being.

"Okay. I trust her. Temporary! But I´m sure Pete won´t like it!"

###

A blood-freezing growl was heard through the streets of San Francisco. The people that were going after their mundane tasks in bright daylight were spreading in all directions. Panic filled their hearts as they heard the growl and saw it´s source. Robbie Baldwin in his demonic form was rushing through the streets and was searching for two individuals that escaped him.

Daisy Johnson and a injured Victor Creed were on the run. They only took side streets and hoped that they could outrun the vengeful spirit. But there was one big problem.

"Stop! Daisy! We can´t escape him!", Sabretooth weakly grunted. His burned hands were hurting more than he would ever admit. And the fact that his healing factor was nullified in this area of his body didn´t make the pain more bearable.

"You- I can´t-" The mutant lost his consciousness and faded. Daisy slapped his face lightly, but to no effect.

"Don´t you dare to- shit. Okay, big guy, I´ll get you outta here...somehow."

She took his arm and placed it around her neck area. Trying her best to carry the man that had at least twice as much weight as herself, she continued the run. But she could already hear the voice of the now named Penance: "This is unnecessary. Give me what I want and I leave!"

Again she thought to hear some honesty out of his voice, but his hellish voice let her rethink that bold guess. Skye grabbed the bestial mutant and wanted to run around the next corner. Bad luck they had, because the first thing she faced was the burning skull screaming for them.

"I don´t wanna harm you.", the fiery voice crackled. The flames were slowly fading and his flesh, skin and hair were slowly growing back and let Daisy recognize the face of Robbie Baldwin.

"Speedball? Why are you one the Thorns?", she asked shocked.

He looked down to the floor and answered ashamed: "He..they...I have my reasons, Quake. And don´t call me that. I don´t deserve my old name anymore. I´m Penance, again."

His head rose up and he looked into her eyes: "Please, hand me whatever you and your folks have stolen from Fisk. Only then I can be free."

"You really believe that, Robbie? 'Penance'?", she asked fierce. "Since when has the Kingpin been a man of his word? How are you even able to be...yourself? How come that you don´t go full Zarathos?"

"The spirit is spread over the bodies of hundreds, if not thousands of people, he is not strong enough to let everyone give a blood lust for souls. Especially when his host is fighting it. Now give me-"

"NO!", Daisy yelled out as she shot one of her seismic waves at his feet. The ground beneath him began to shake and broke under him. He fell into the sewers and was knocked out, while Daisy took her unconscious comrade and carried him away.

Thankfully, she hadn´t walk too much. A dark cloud opened in front of her and she saw Jessica, Luke, Cloak, Dagger and some strange, tattooed guy she assumed to be Mr. Willis. Behind them were a lot of boxes they always had with them when they refilled their supplies.

"Daisy! Where are Pete and Phil? And what the hell is going on here?", Luke asked demanding.

She quickly responded in short words: "Separated! Thorns! Reaper! Scorpia! New Rider!"

"Where have you seen them the last time?", he asked again and was answered with her finger pointing towards the direction she and Sabretooth came from. Cage nodded and told the others:

"Dagger, you come with me. Cloak, you bring them back to our hideout. But you come back here to get us out!"

Without any further stops, everyone did as he told. Cage and Dagger rushed towards the directions they hoped they would find their two friends, while the rest vanished in another cloud made out of Cloak´s darkforce.

###

Some streets away, Spider-Man and Phil Coulson were walking aimless through the harbor area of San Francisco. Exhausted, Phil asked: "Do you think we got rid of them?"

Spidey shook his head: "No, my spider-sense tells me otherwise." Suddenly he threw the shield from his back towards Phil direction and yelled: "Duck!"

Coulson was able to react in time as heard the metallic sound of the Vibranium hitting something behind him. As he looked behind him, he saw one of the Thorns unconscious on the floor.

"Back in the day, you would have made an excellent agent, Spider-Man. Weren´t your parents agents of SHIELD?"

"Yeah, but I preferred being solo. I was never the Jason Bourne-type."

Both were running as they heard a group of engines coming closer. During their run they continued their conversation.

"And yet you were a long-standing member of the Avengers-"

"The times, they´re changing.", Spidey quickly witted.

"And sometimes people could get the impression that you were the fifth member of the F4 or even one of the X-Men!"

The engines were coming closer and both men jumped over a fence into a huge yard with a delivery entrance, which didn´t looked like it had been used in years.

"No offense, Phil, but starting unnecessary and annoying talks during a battle is _my_ shtick!"

The engines were now impossible to miss by ear. And it only took a few seconds for some Thorns to circle them, riding on their motorcycles or sitting in some cars. Their laughter rang through the whole area and would probably kept stuck into the ears of the men surrounded by them until their final breath. Which was probably not _that_ far away.

"Let me get a piece of them!", the Grim Reaper said. His costume was torn and tattered by the debris that had fallen onto him. Besides him was Scorpia, whose armor had some scratches and dents because of the same reason.

"Wow, you both look like you had a rough night. Brought the roof down, eh?", the wall-crawler mocked, which angered the Reaper even more. He lifted his scythe with the intention of cutting his chosen victims into pieces. But suddenly he stopped and just grinned.

"Why did you stop, Williams?", Scorpia´s surprise was only equalized by her anger.

"He´s obviously a fan of my stand-up comedy and lets us go.", Spidey quipped.

"Can´t you just use your web to swing us out?", Coulson whispered to the masked marvel. The answer was not what he hoped it would be: "Nope, my shooters are empty. Used every last bit on that ball that saved us in the warehouse."

"That´s unfortunate!"

"We´ll keep them as our prisoners. Torture will make them spill the whereabouts of their friends!", the hooded, scythe-wielding villain declared. Everyone seemed to like the idea. Everyone besides the both in men in question, of course.

"Ever heard of the Neverland? Because there they are. So you have no need to torture us and we can go, right?", Spidey quipped again.

Because of this he heard a voice behind him, telling him to shut up. At the same moment his spider-sense rang and he took a step to the side to dodge the flaming fist of the Thorn who talked to him. At the same moment his warning system rang off again, but it was too late.

A inching pain ran through his right shoulder. Spider-Man looked at it and saw Scorpia´s stinger stuck in his own body.

"Oww! That´s not very...", he said before he faded out and fell onto the ground.

"Spider-Man! What have you done?", Coulson exclaimed as he tried rushing to the shield-wearing, masked hero. But he was instantly stopped by Grim Reaper´s free hand, which was clenched to a fist and rammed into Phil´s stomach.

"He is not dead, yet. I only sedated him. We don´t want you both dead. Not until we brought you to Kingpin. He probably wants to see who stole his precious energy source."

She grabbed the sedated hero by his neck and stared into the white lenses of his mask, adding:

"I´m pretty sure Mr. Fisk wants his own piece of him. Let´s go!"

Two Thorns grabbed Coulson and carried him away, following Reaper and Scorpia, who was carrying Spidey on her back like a fireman. Reaper pressed a button on an earpiece hidden under his mask and talked into it: "We got two of them. Ready for extraction."

He was quickly answered from the other side: "We already see you!"

Jet engines were heard and Coulson was shocked to see one of the Quinjets the Avengers used back in the day. It landed in front of them and opened it´s ramp. From it came two armored men out, and waved them over.

Scorpia and Reaper took their prisoners with them. The ramp closed behind them and the Quinjet took off. The scythe-wielding villain placed Coulson in a rude manner on one of the seats.

The unconscious Spider-Man was placed besides the trained agent.

"Okay, chaps. Where to go?", asked a British voice from the pilot´s seat. Toad turned around and grinned towards both prisoners, revealing his yellow teeth, which haven´t been brushed in years.

Mystique was sitting on his right and deadpanned: "Just go, Toad."

###

Only a few blocks away Cage and Dagger were running faster than ever before. They saw the Quinjet hovering in the sky before it landed.

"C´mon, Tandy. They´ll get away!", Cage grunted.

"I´m not a speedster! Guess what my powers are! Hint: it´s in my name!", she gasped in a sarcastic tone. The big, bald-headed man ignored her statement and kept on running. He was imagining the worst possible things that could happen to his friends. And he wanted to avoid any scenario playing in his head. They lost enough friends.

After a few more seconds they reached the yard the Quinjet landed. But they were still to late.

Luke cursed himself as he saw the flying vehicle again hovering high in the air and rushing away. Dagger tried to throw some of their name-giving light objects at it, but missed.  
"NOOO!", she cried out. "We couldn´t save them. They´re..."

"Probably fine. We´ll find them. And we´ll save them!", Cage calmed her down for the moment. But he was having a bad time doing so just because he felt the same way.

They stood there and waited for Cloak, who arrived like planned.

"Where are Spidey and Coulson?", he asked confused, but was answered with silence. "Are they-?"

"No! I´ll tell you all back in the base...", Cage muttered.

###

With it´s high-speed the jet reached the east of the former USA very quickly. During the flight Scorpia had to reassure Reaper multiple times that their sedated victim is still alive. Coulson just sat there and said nothing. It was not a new situation to him. When he was still one of SHIELD´s top agents, he found himself in situations like this all the time. But this time there was no back-up. No way to call a rescue team. So he waited and hoped for the best. For now.

After a while the jet got slower and Mystique said: "We´re arriving in the next few seconds. Get our guests to our vault. But hurry. We´re already late, and you know how the Fisks are..."

The landing was successful and the ramp was let down. Reaper, Scorpia, the two armored Thorns and Mystique were taking their prisoners out. Wilson and Vanessa Fisk, both sharp dressed in their best suit and dress respectively, were already waiting.

"You´re late!", Wilson shot.

Mystique calmly, but still fierce answered by pointing towards Coulson and Spider-Man:

"That´s our reason why. Must be like Christmas for you!"

Kingpin looked at both men and grinned with evil intent as he saw that his long-time enemy was laying in front of him. Helpless like a puppet.

"Ms. Coll. Mr. Williams. Would you kindly bring our guests into their dorms? My wife and I are already late for our appointment. And where is Mr. Baldwin?"

"We lost track of him. But I´m pretty sure he´ll return, soon." Reaper explained and added confused: "Sir. Weren´t we supposed to accompany you?"

"Yes, Mr. Williams, you _were_. But after you and Ms. Coll took so long, we decided to take some more reliable individuals with us. Mr. Dillon, Mr. Sytsevich."

Out of the shadows stepped Electro and a huge man, wearing a gray body armor and a horn on his head forward. Electro and Rhino caught a peek at the unconscious Spider-Man and the living lightning stated: "Can´t wait to get back here and give this guy what he deserves."

"Yeah, can´t wait to impale his heart on my horn.", Rhino grunted.

"Please, gentlemen. Everyone will have some fun. But first of all, we have some business to attend to.", Kingpin grinned and entered the jet, his wife by his side. "Ms. Darkholme, we´re ready."

Mystique, looking like she had been disgusted to a small extend by something, gave Toad a nod and he started the engines. The Fisks and their two bodyguards were sitting down when Rhino asked:

"So, what is this business about, boss?"

Vanessa answered instead of her husband and explained vaguely: "Something that will take some days."

###

"What do ya mean, they have been taken away? And what was that thing about Mystique?"

Cage and Dagger have been brought back into the hideout by Cloak. The former hero for hire told everyone present about the incidents that happened in the city. When he described how he and Dagger saw that Spider-Man and Coulson have been abducted, different types of emotions have been awoken inside their friends.

Skye was devastated by the thought of losing the man that was like a father to her.

Jessica Drew felt the same way about her male counterpart, who became one of her closest friends since their time as Avengers.

Natasha and Rhodey thought like soldiers and already thought of ways how to safe them.

And Johnny, hot-headed as ever, would´ve loved nothing better than to go immediately out to get them back. But he was also furious about the revelation of their mole.

"Where is Sabretooth? I´d love to have a little chat with him!"

"He is in the infirmary. His hands are not healing like they are supposed to. Currently he is unconscious.", answered X-23, who came through a door behind him. "He has third-degree burns on both sides."

"Great! That won´t cost so much time to burn the rest of him!", Johnny flinched through his teeth as he tried to storm into the infirmary. But he was stopped by Jessica Drew, who just placed her hand on Johnny´s shoulder and said: "It´s not helpful. And I personally think you would get into trouble with Wade, if you kill Victor before he can."

Skye nodded and added: "And it´s no good if we decimate ourselves when we´re already the hunted..."

Silence filled the room. Everyone´s head was now hanging down. It was a uncomfortable silence.

Because everyone knew what the others were thinking: Are their friends still alive?

It was Johnny again who broke the silence by asking Cage: "So, big man. What we´re gonna do?

Hijack one of Kingpin´s jets in the city and lay our shit onto Kingpin´s lawn?"

Luke just looked at him and nodded: "Exactly, matchstick!"

###

"Are you awake?"

"Gimme just five more minutes. Auntie...", Spider-Man muttered as he opened his eyes. He stared at blank steel walls. His ears caught Coulson´s voice very close by, but the web-head was unable to turn his head and move his hands. As he looked down, he caught view of some heavy bonds.

"Ech...let me guess: either we are prisoners in a uncomfortable cell or we celebrated someone´s stag party and it ended like that movie with that fat, bearded guy. Is there a tiger in our bathroom?"

Coulson chuckled a bit sadly and answered: "It´s the first one. And I doubt that we even have a bathroom down here."

"So, knowing that nobody has been married, why are we here?"

"Grim Reaper attacked us, Scorpia poisoned you, Mystique and Toad brought us here."

"Hmph, now I even remember the first two parts...Mystique? And Toad? I didn´t knew that the Brotherhood of Mutant Supremacy is also part of Fisk´s army. Aren´t the Sinister Twelve and the Wrecking Crew enough?", Spidey ranted as he gained more of his consciousness back.

"So, you are the experienced 007 here: what´s gonna happen next? A bit shaking or stirring?"

With a dead-serious voice Coulson answered: "They want that energy source, that Romanov and her team extracted from the Triskelion. Whatever it is, the Fisks put it on top of their priority list and are willing to do anything to get it back. And part of this will be our questioning to gain much needed information. They want our location, how many we are and what we are planning."

"Our only plan now is survival. And judging from what you just said: They´re gonna torture us?"

"They´re gonna torture us."

"Great, just when I haven´t washed my socks in weeks...", Spidey deadpanned.

No more words were exchanged. Both were sitting there and waiting for their tormentor.

They were unaware of who it would be, but it wouldn´t matter. Both would never give away anything that could get their friends into danger. Even if both had to pay it with their own deaths.

It took some more minutes until something happened. A door opened and a huge silhouette became visible. They only saw that the man was at least six feet tall and had shoulders like a Asgardian warrior. He also held something in his hand, but neither of the two prisoners could recognize what it was.

When the colossal man came closer, they could see one feature after another. His purple mask. His bearded chin. His green jacket. And that the object in his hand was a crowbar.

Dirk Garthwaite alias the Wrecker grinned with bad intentions and shrugged:

"Sorry, it took so long. Needed my warm-up first."

###

Hey, everyone!

And as Wrecker just said, SORRY, that it took so long. I had a hard time writing this chapter, mainly because:

My head was already 6 to 7 chapters ahead. It´s kinda like, chaotic flow of ideas in there, not only for this story.

I wasn´t really in the mood for any Marvel-related stuff in a while now. Civil War II, ANAD Marvel, Death of X and so on gave me really a hard time in that matter. My whole purchase list was changed to DC titles.

But don´t worry, I´ll try my very best to make this story as epic as possible and nothing of this will influence my story in any way!

Like I said, many other story ideas are running through my head. Parallel to this I´m also writing a Steampunk/Occult-novel in my native language. And I´m also planning a video game related story, but it´s still a rough concept in my head.

Besides that, I hope you kinda liked this chapter. And I try my best to get the stuff going.


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